ALAIN TANNER

Alain Tanner (Geneva, 6 December 1929) is a Swiss film director.
Son of a painter and an actress, Tanner studied economics and, in 1951, he founded the university cineclub of Geneva together with Claude Goretta. At 23 he embarks on the merchant marine where he stays two years. From 1955 to 1958, he lives in London where he is passionate about cinema and finds a job at the British Film Institute.
In 1957 he made his first film with Claude Goretta, Nice Time (Picadilly la nuit). The film won the experimental film award at the 1957 Nice Festival.
On his return from Britain, he found work as a director on French-speaking Switzerland where he produced several works, short films and documentaries, including one shot during the Florence flood of December 1966. In 1968 he founded the Group of 5 together with Claude Goretta, Michel Soutter, Jean-Louis Roy and Jean-Jacques Lagrange to promote the young Swiss cinema.
He became known internationally in the seventies, with films such as La salamandra with Bulle Ogier, Jonas who will be twenty years old in 2000 and Charles mort ou vif with whom he won at the Locarno Film Festival.