City Lights

The Rote Fabrik film group developed the City Lights (Frühlingsflimmern & Herbstflimmern) series in early 2000, in response to the rather late start of the open-air film season in Zurich.

As the first beautiful days in spring come by, everybody flocks out into the open - why not enjoy an open-air movie? Eventually, the City Lights spring series were complimented with a fall edition, as a prolongation of the open-air season.

The film screenings take place at lively locations in town. The chosen location stands in a direct relation to the film's story. Nanni Morretti's «Caro Diario» was for instance presented at Palu's legendary Vespa workshop on the Steinfels premises. A love-story, set in the S-Bahn (city train) of Berlin, was shown next to the old S-Bahn coach at the Oberer Letten.

A central aspect of the Frühlingsflimmern & Herbstflimmern series is to move the film screenings to down-town Zurich. At times it is hard to motivate the audience to travel all the way to Wollishofen, at the outskirts of the city, so the Rote Fabrik has for some time now been promoting events that deliberately take place outside of its premises.