Creative Documentary Architecture of Happiness
In Development
Campione d’Italia lies on Lake Lugano, surrounded by the Swiss canton of Ticino.
For almost a hundred years, the exclave has lived exclusively from this casino, both economically and in the self-image of its inhabitants. It was an employer for everyone, and it was glamor, cosmopolitanism, luxury villas, Sophia Loren, Frederico Fellini; the fur coats, the cars! Their glitter gilded everyone.
In 2018, however, the casino filed for bankruptcy overnight. Since then, the municipality and its unemployed residents have also gone bankrupt. Sadness hangs over the streets and promenades; above all this, the casino broods as a monolith that has become meaningless.
What happens to a community whose center of meaning suddenly no longer exists? How does it reorganize itself and its social structures? Does it find the courage and insight to embrace something new, or does everything sink into lethargy? The film traces these universal processes in the manageable structure of a village community. Its concept is not investigative in the journalistic sense, but rather questioning in the sense of an essay. Its protagonist is a friendly fool whom everyone in Campione knows. For he plants flowers in this gray place.
Countries of production: DE/CH
Runtime: 80´
Year: 2024
Languages: Italian, French
Subtitles: German, English
