Saturday 20 June, 21:00

Madama Butterfly

Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, presented here as a cinematic staging, distills the composer’s sweeping lyricism into intimate, aching tableaux. The tragic tale of love, duty and cultural collision unfolds through luminous orchestral waves and close, lingering frames that reveal fragile hopes and unbearable silence. Themes of longing, misunderstanding and sacrifice are rendered with a tactile emotionality—voice and image braided into mournful beauty. The film’s sensorial textures—velvet voices, slow-burning tableaux and aching stillness—linger long after the final chord.

Parc des Eaux-Vives,
Geneva
{"title":"Madama Butterfly","description":"\u003Cp\u003EGiacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly, presented here as a cinematic staging, distills the composer's sweeping lyricism into intimate, aching tableaux. The tragic tale of love, duty and cultural collision unfolds through luminous orchestral waves and close, lingering frames that reveal fragile hopes and unbearable silence. Themes of longing, misunderstanding and sacrifice are rendered with a tactile emotionality\u2014voice and image braided into mournful beauty. The film's sensorial textures\u2014velvet voices, slow-burning tableaux and aching stillness\u2014linger long after the final chord.\u003C\/p\u003E","start_date":"2026-06-20","end_date":"2026-06-20","date":"Saturday 20 June, 21:00","timings":[{"timing_start_date":"20260620T190000Z","timing_end_date":"20260620T213000Z"}]}
Photo Credit: Joëlle Flumet

You might also like

30 March – 15 June

A spring cycle from the Geneva University Film Club marks the 150th anniversary of UNIGE’s Faculty of Medicine, gathering ten films that probe medicine’s moral and emotional terrain. From Alfred Hitchcock’s psychoanalytic intrigue to Ingmar Bergman’s introspective intensity and David Cronenberg’s clinical horror, the program sketches portraits of doctors, caregivers and patients: dream-work, ethical dilemmas, bodily fragility and devoted care. Shot in textures from dreamlike chiaroscuro to clinical close-ups, the films balance unease and tenderness with exacting cinematic rhythms.

In French.

Tuesday 16 June, 20:00

An intimate decade-spanning portrait of Shewit, who flees Eritrea and journeys alone to Europe, arriving in Switzerland as a teenager with dreams and hopes. Filmed over ten years, the documentary traces her struggle without residency, her fight against expulsion and her quest for emancipation. Through observational cinematography and patient long-form storytelling, the film renders resilience, longing and the everyday courage of a young woman carving a life against political and bureaucratic pressures.

Screening with the movie team.

Wednesday 17 June, 20:00

Through intimate testimonies and private archive footage, this documentary traces Zucchero’s career and inner life. Colleagues and friends — including Bono, Sting, Brian May, Andrea Bocelli and others — reflect on his music and persona, while concert images from his World Wild Tour give the film a powerful live dimension. Less a conventional portrait than an emotional voyage, it probes doubt, fragility and the soul of an artist.

Screening in original version with English subtitles. A post-screening conversation with the directors follows.

September 2025 – June 2026

LES SŒURS LUMIÈRE, the feminist film club of the Bibliothèque Filigrane, returns to Les Cinémas du Grütli with a cycle of six screenings from September 2025 to June 2026. Dedicated to the courtroom drama, this new edition offers a feminist re-reading of the genre, highlighting the challenges women face when confronted with moral and repressive orders.

Program Details:

  • Saint Omer — Alice Diop, 2022 (France): Thursday 25 September 2025

  • Une part du ciel — Bénédicte Liénard, 2002 (Belgium/France): Thursday 13 November 2025

  • Anna Göldin – Dernière sorcière — Gertrud Pinkus, 1992 (Switzerland): Thursday 29 January 2026

  • Le Silence autour de Christine M. — Marleen Gorris, 1982 (Netherlands): Thursday 5 March 2026

  • L’Audition — Lisa Gerig, 2023 (Switzerland): Thursday 7 May 2026

  • Hannah Arendt — Margarethe von Trotta, 2012 (Germany): Thursday 18 June 2026

All screening at 20:30.

Thursday 18 June, 11:00

Curated with Animatou, this relaxed screening invites audiences into a gentle cinematic space where the lights stay soft and the door remains open. The program showcases short animated works that favour texture, rhythm and intimate gestures, presented with lowered sound to welcome diverse needs. Emphasizing presence and sensory detail over plot, the session foregrounds communal response—laughter, movement, quiet—while offering a calm, attentive frame for discovering films in an accessible, non-judgemental atmosphere.

Thursday 18 June, 18:30

Directed by an unspecified filmmaker, Les fleurs du Manguier unfolds as a lyrical portrait of lives shaped by displacement and memory. The film favors lingering frames, textured natural light and quiet rhythms to trace intimate connections and the small gestures that hold communities together. Along a thread of memory it follows interwoven encounters, exploring belonging, loss and resilience without revealing outcomes. Atmospheric and sensorial, the work’s strength lies in its subtle emotional logic and tactile visual poetry.

Talk with several guests as part of World Refugee Day.

Oops! It seems there
are no events matching your selection!

Please adjust your criteria to see more results.

Newsletter

Culture, curated weekly.

Add to Calendar

Select the date to be saved in your Google calendar.

calendar placeholder

Done!

Event removed from your CoolAgenda.

Yeah!

Event Saved to your CoolAgenda

Add to CoolAgenda

In your CoolAgenda

Date

Title

Location

Description

calendar placeholder

Reset password

Password was reset

Your password has been reset successfully. You can now log in with your new password.

Check your Inbox

We’ve sent you a password reset email to the address provided. Please check your inbox and/or spam folder.

Forgot your password?

Thank you!

Please check your inbox for a verification email to complete your sign-up.

Sign Up

Create your Account and Culture Up!