This year, the Zurich Film Festival is showing a remarkable number of films written, produced and/or directed by women. Most of these films focus on one or more multifaceted female protagonists. The festival is of course also a good platform to showcase the freshest Swiss films by promising young filmmakers. Two of these Swiss filmmakers, whose films "Blue My Mind” and "Sarah Plays a Werewolf” are competing for the Golden Eye Award in the German/Swiss/Austrian section, are Lisa Brühlmann and Katharina Wyss. The filmmakers, who also wrote the scripts, have delivered two intriguing first full-length features about the awkward phase of adolescence. 

"Blue My Mind” centres on 15-year-old Mia (Luna Wedler). Due to her father’s new job the family has relocated and Mia is transferred to a new school. As if trying to fit in and finding friends on the hormonal battleground that is a classroom full of teenagers is not enough, she has to deal with her own physical transition to womanhood. The beautiful blue-eyed girl joins the cool kids and the full package of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll that cool kids usually have to offer, and starts distancing herself from her worrying parents. She gets her first period, which makes her moody and strange. Mia does not just get awkward like most teenage girls when they have their period. Suddenly, she feels the urge to eat the fish from her aquarium and her feet start to change in surreal ways. 

This is the beginning of a fascinating allegory concerning the physical challenges that young women experience during adolescence. Close-ups of Mia’s face show the beauty and the fragility of her age but also that impermeable mask that is so typical for teenagers. When an adult tries to understand what Mia is going through, she puts on that mask and goes back to her tribe of girlfriends. "Blue My Mind” is also a movie about friendship and the special bond between girls that is formed at that age. 

Sarah (Loane Balthasar), on the other hand, is 17 years old and has no friends. She is not asocial; in fact she plays in her school’s theatre group and speaks her mind in class. Nevertheless, she seems slightly odd. Sarah pours all of her heart and soul into art and has a tendency for exaggeration, which at times seems important for the required acting pathos, while on other occasions it makes her shoot peculiar lies out of her mouth. One day, for instance, she tells someone from the theatre group that her brother has committed suicide while he is well and alive. The others from the group try to approach and befriend her, but she sabotages their efforts. There are hints already in the earlier scenes, warning the audience that there is something deeper behind Sarah’s moods, which later turn into a very disturbing truth.  

"Sarah Plays a Werewolf” is a compelling portrayal of a teenager carrying a horrible secret. Loane Balthasar’s performance as the sensitive, bright and troubled Sarah and Luna Wedler’s portrayal of another sensitive, bright and troubled young woman in "Blue My Mind” are both sublime.