Eye For Film >> Movies >> A Happy Family (2026) Film Review
Switzerland is not all chocolate box vistas, wealth, and serene surroundings. Director Jan-Éric Mack explores the darker underbelly of Swiss society with this ironically titled drama about a single mother down on her luck whose children are taken into custody because of “neglect”.
Because the older child accidentally sets the family home alight they are taken in to foster care and their mother is banned legally to have any contact with them. She holds down two jobs – during the day in a laundry and on two evenings a week in a nightclub.
The narrative is shown purely from the point of view of the main protagonist Niki (superbly played by Anna Schinz) who, despite obstacles, determines to try to get back her children. Schinz came up with the initial idea for the film and assumed an added position as one of the writing team.
Niki has so much debt that her wages are taken away to pay it off, which, with an absent partner, leaves her with very little on which to raise her family. The chaotic domestic routine is observed at the start of the film when the camera pans away to reveal a social worker making an assessment.
It adopts almost the pace of thriller as Niki heads some distance across the country, finds a menial job at the school where the children attend, and observes them furtively in the playground and elsewhere. With her fair hair dyed dark to avoid detection she keeps a maternal eye on the children before deciding how to resolve the situation.
As the first Swiss film to make it to the Crystal Globe Competition in Karlovy Vary it successfully mixes genres rather purely being a social drama. It combines moments of tension with humour and invites the viewer to make their own moral judgments as the narrative unfurls.
Parents are known to take extreme measures when their children are taken away but Mack is careful to show that the children also have a conflict of loyalty to their “new” family and their mother.
Filmed on a muted colour palette the film exploits the country’s scenic resources in a way that has not often been seen before.
Reviewed on: 05 Jul 2026
