17-year-old Gabriel is a passionate skater. He takes care of his two-year-old son Jamie alone and is a loving father to him. When his best friend Joel introduces him to his girlfriend Corry, he gets carried away and takes drugs with them. On the trip, they get into the city zoo. When he regains consciousness, the first thing he does is apologise to his son for this lapse. For Gabriel, this was a slip, because he takes his responsibility as a father very seriously.

What follows is “a wild, insane ride (…), a deeply touching father-son story! SOUL OF A BEAST is a firework of images, music, sounds, sensuality and magic.” (from: Jury statement of the Max Ophüls Prize 2022)

Lorenz Merz, born in 1981 in Zurich/Switzerland, completed training in painting, music and photography and studied film at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) and the Universidad del Cine Buenos Aires in Argentina. With films such as UN DIA Y NADA and CHERRY PIE as well as for his camera work for SUMMER GAMES and WAR he won many awards and three Swiss Film Prizes.

Filmography (selection): 2000 LOW TIDE, 2007 THE LITTLE SAMURAI, 2008 UN DÍA Y NADA (all short films), 2013 CHERRY PIE, 2021 SOUL OF A BEAST

Awards (selection): Prize for Best Director and Best Young Actor (Max Ophüls Preis Film Festival, Saarbrücken/Germany 2021), Prize of the Ecumenical Jury and Special Mention in the Competition for the Golden Leopard (Locarno Film Festival, Switzerland 2021)