Longwave
Filmfest 2014
(Les Grandes Ondes (À L’Ouest))
(LES GRANDES ONDES (À L'OUEST))
France, Portugal, Switzerland 2013
Original version with English subtitles
(Original: French, Portuguese)
German Premiere
Director: Lionel Baier
Section: International Independents
April, 1974. Two mismatched reporters working for Swiss Radio are sent to Portugal to do a puff-piece on Swiss foreign aid there. But nothing goes as planned. The atmosphere between Julie Dujonc-Renens, a young idealistic feminist and Joseph-Marie Cauvin, a wily, old-school war correspondent, is charged. And then sparks fly during the trip with Bob, their sound engineer approaching retirement. Not even the cheery disposition of Pelé, their young Portuguese translator, makes any difference. The projects financed by Switzerland prove to be calamitous and the workers' revolution that suddenly breaks out doesn't help, obliging our heroes to disregard first the radio's management, and then their own codes of conduct. But the winds of historic change steer their VW van to the centre of the 'Carnation Revolution' in this cinema-savvy screwball comedy.
Cast: Valérie Donzelli, Michel Vuillermoz, Patrick Lapp, Francisco Belard, Jean-Stéphane Bron
Credits
Screenplay: Lionel Baier, Julien Bouissoux
Director of Photography: Patrick Lindenmaier
Film Editor: Pauline Gaillard
Composer: Georges Gershwin
Production Designer: Georges Ayusawa
Costume Design: Françoise Nicolet
Sound: Henri Maikoff
Producer: Pauline Gygax
Co-Producer: Max Karli, Philippe Martin
Production Company: Rita Productions
World Sales: Films Boutique GmbH
Director: Lionel Baier
