Interview: Bettina Oberli (Late Bloomers)

“Late Bloomers,” a film about daring to live out personal passions in the autumn of life, focuses on women resisting the role of subservience thrust upon them in Swiss society. The film has foreshadowed this European country’s political turn-around in a charming social comedy. The term “late bloomers” has become a popular catch-phrase in Switzerland, referring to women in their later years who have the courage to follow their dreams, even where those dreams conflict with traditional societal constraints.

With a well-cast and gorgeous setting in the the idyllic world famous Emmental, the Swiss entry for the Academy Awards Foreign Film consideration is a crowd pleaser with a winning formula à la Chocolat or television’s The Golden Girls. Late Bloomers is about a widowed woman who fulfills her lifelong dream of opening a Lingerie shop in her conservative village where her son is the priest and everybody knows each other. With the help of her girl friends she defies the village. The film has become the most successful Swiss film in over 25 years. I met with director Bettina Oberli after the screening at the Goethe Institute in Los Angeles.

Bettina Oberli

Yama Rahimi: Late Bloomers is more of a crowd pleasing entertainment than the art film type.
Please tell about the development of the film from the idea to
completion?
Bettina Oberli: It took two and half years from the first idea to the 
completion. I was inspired by my grandmother about what she would do if
she followed her heart and free. At first nobody wanted to make a film
about old women until a small TV station gave us the funds. So we shot
the film 24 days which is not a lot of time.
 
YR: There’s a great sense of American optimism in the film.
BO: That you can do whatever you want. (laughing)

YR: Which is a good thing given the success of the film. In hindsight I’m sure everybody says why nobody of it earlier, right?
BO: Now that’s what everybody’s saying but then they would say why
would anybody want to watch four old ladies. That’s not very
interesting because the target audience is 18-24 year old males.

YR: Sounds like Hollywood.
BO: Yes and it’s not true. There’s an absolute audience for films like that.

YR: Tell me about your cast, specially lead actress Stephanie Glaser?
BO: I know her from growing up. She’s prominent theater and TV actress.
Initially I wanted her for a supporting role but after I met her I knew
she was the lead which is her first ever leading role in a feature
film. Some of the actors came back from retirement for the this project.
 
YR: How was the film received in other countries?
BO: Very well. It was released and received well all over Europe as it was in Japan where we just came from.
 
YR: I’m sure they will remake it for the US. Would you be open to it?
BO: Yes, why not? But it’s not my problem anymore but I would never do my own remake.
YR: I hope you don’t.

YR: What’s the state of film production in Switzerland? How many feature films gets made every year?
BO: About 20 which is not much and most of them never gets shown in the US because it’s a difficult market due to its own homegrown films. We show films from all over the world including Hollywood.

YR: Our site is more focused on independent and foreign film than mainstream Hollywood. Our credo is “We love subtitles.”
BO: That’s cool. You know we show all the films in Switzerland in their original language with subtitles. We never dub but they do it in Germany. So Switzerland is paradise for film loves because everything is in their original language.

YR: I know. They also dub in France and Italy. Actually I grew up in Germany I grew up with them but when I came here I discovered again because a lot gets lost in the dubbing. Anyway what’s next for you?
BO: I’m doing a film in Germany. I got an offer from Wüste Film which made Head On.  It’s a dark, dark film about the evil. It’s psychological thriller. They offered me to adapt a book and direct it, so we start in two months.

YR: Well thank you for your time. I’m looking forward to your dark thriller.
BO: Thank you.