One Swiss cop forged 3,600 passports and saved 3,600 lives. The state destroyed his.
1938. Austria has been annexed by Nazi Germany, and Switzerland has closed its borders for Jewish refugees - a death sentence for thousands. But not all Swiss officials observe this inhuman order.
Acting
Stefan Kurt's exhausted, stubborn decency
Direction
Gsponer makes stamps and ledgers feel lethal
Writing
Dialogue that weaponizes politeness
Director
Alain Gsponer
Stefan Kurt
Paul Grüninger
Maximilian Simonischek
Robert Frei
Anatole Taubman
Sidney Dreifuss
Ursina Lardi
Alice Grüninger
Helmut Förnbacher
Valentin Keel
Julia Jelinek
Jüdin
Robert Hunger-Bühler
Heinrich Rothmund
Beat Marti
Alfons Eigenmann
Aaron Hitz
Ernst Kamm
Peter Jecklin
Walter Härtsch
Patrick Rapold
Ernest Prodollier
Monica Reyes
Ida Kreutner
Alexander E. Fennon
Heinrich Rothmund
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The real Paul Grüninger was posthumously exonerated in 1995; Switzerland didn't officially apologize to Holocaust survivors until 1995.
Director Alain Gsponer deliberately cast German-speaking Swiss actors to capture the specific dialect and class tensions of St. Gallen in 1938.
CH
