Impact Days Catalogue
fifdh
By Lisa Gerig and Lisa Gerig

L' Audition (The Hearing)

Die Anhörung
Image du film The Hearing - FIFDH 2023
IMPACT DAYS

What happens when your future depends on telling your own life story? Four rejected asylum seekers relive the hearing on their reasons for fleeing their homelands, thus shedding light on the core of the asylum procedure. Those who succeed in recounting the personal danger in their home country ‘credibly and without contradiction’ have a better chance of receiving asylum. Will the interviewees be able to describe their memories of traumatic experiences in such a way that they meet the official criteria this time? A simple swapping of roles reverses the balance of power for once, with SEM interviewers answering the questions of the asylum seekers. In this way, The Hearing not only provides insight into the crucial yet sensitive hearings process, but also questions the asylum procedure itself. 

Sections : Impact Days, Impact Days
Country : Switzerland
Original languages : German, English, French, Tamil, Dari
Directors
Lisa Gerig
Lisa Gerig (Switzerland)
Producers
Eva Vitija
Maurizius Stärkle Drux
Eva Vitija (Switzerland)
Maurizius Staerkle Drux (Switzerland)
Ensemble Film
Completion
March 2023
Impact Statement
How is it decided in Switzerland who is allowed to stay? Who is recognized as a refugee? The film gets to the bottom of these questions. In the current practice of asylum hearings, there is no guarantee that asylum seekers have a real chance of being heard. Trauma, class and origin-specific differences, language barriers and many other challenges can make a "credible and non-contradictory" narrative impossible as required by asylum legislation. Furthermore, politically motivated restrictions lead to unacceptable negative asylum decisions. The film questions the hearings and decisions of the asylum authorities and shows that there is a need for action. The implementation of the protection concept of the Geneva Refugee Convention is endangered on various levels. This must not be allowed to happen.
The Hearing wants to raise awareness of the shortcomings of asylum hearings. The authorities concerned should drastically improve the way they deal with asylum seekers during interviews, especially traumatized people.
Impact Goals
  1. Raising awareness through film screenings and TV broadcasts, the general public, the concerned authorities and their staff as well as law enforcement parties are to be made aware of the problems of the current asylum legislation and its implementation. There should be room for fundamental questions about the legitimacy of selection of asylum seekers, and for discussing the actual shortcomings of the asylum procedures.
  2. Concrete improvement measures on the part of the authorities. For example, the handling of traumatized asylum seekers in interviews should be drastically improved.
  3. Adapt the law / expand the concept of refugee: At the level of monitoring legislation and its equitable implementation, gender and other new reasons for flight such as global warming must be taken into account in defining a reason for flight that is relevant to asylum.
  4. Sensitizing young audiences to the problems of flight and asylum by having school screenings embedded in accompanying lessons on these themes.
Impact Strategy
  • We want to encourage political organizations to organize pre-premieres with a combined film programme and discussions.
  • We want to organize closed-door screenings with representatives and employees of the SEM, which will be accompanied by discussions with specialists in the field of trauma. We want to organize accompanied film screenings for parliamentarians in Switzerland and for UNHCR representatives.
  • For the theatrical distribution we’re looking for cooperation with schools, especially through the association Kinokultur in der Schule, a Swiss organisations specialising in bringing films to schools with a combined educational program.
Contact
Primary contact
Eva Vitija (Switzerland): vitija@ensemblefilm.ch
Participants present at the Impact Days
Eva Vitija (Switzerland)
Lisa Gerig (Switzerland)

Organisations
Solinetz Zürich
Amnesty international
Solidarité sans frontières

Film funds and agencies
Federal Office of Culture
Zurich Film Foundation
Swissfilms

Distribution and sales
Outside the Box
Rise and Shine

Broadcasters
Swiss Television SRF and SRG
Kinokultur für die Schule / Cineculture, cinéma pour l’école

Organisations
Solinetz Zürich
Amnesty international
Solidarité sans frontières

Film funds and agencies
Federal Office of Culture
Zurich Film Foundation
Swissfilms

Distribution and sales
Outside the Box
Rise and Shine

Broadcasters
Swiss Television SRF and SRG
Kinokultur für die Schule / Cineculture, cinéma pour l’école