First Hand Films

World Sales, Production and Theatrical Distribution in Switzerland since 1998: Relevance, Authenticity, Entertainment, with Passion for eQuality. First Hand Films is an award-winning international sales company, a theatrical distributor in Switzerland’s four language regions and a producer based in Zürich. Run by Esther van Messel since 1998, FHF works with ambitious and accessible projects worldwide, combining intelligence, practical knowledge and experience. Today, First Hand Films have been seen by many millions of people all over the world, in cinemas, on TV and online. Accessible & passionate one-offs, features, series, slots, theme nights, new media: around 250 hand-picked titles from all over the world in a constantly renewed catalogue. We get to work when the good stories open up universes we never knew existed, when the story takes us through hell and back, when it walks rainbows with us, and we learn something about a complex and beautiful world. And when all emotions convey a statement, a political one, a human one, the filmmakers’ very own one. When there is authenticity in the plot and fantasy in the images. And when we come back to find a world that will never look the same again. In Switzerland, we operate as theatrical distributors for fiction and documentaries, releasing around half a dozen films a year, from Swiss films to Cannes Caméra d’Or Cannes and Oscar winners. Back in 2009, we took BURMA VJ to an Academy Award® nomination in 2010, and in 2014, we received an Honorary Award by the MiradasDoc festival for “having been able to rejuvenate the language of documentary filmmaking and bring it closer to our living rooms.” https://vimeo.com/firsthandfilms