Autumn bonfire – Fire at the Grandhotel Waldhaus

In a once-glorious international spa resort now in decline, the legendary grand hotel is destroyed by fire. Even before the police’s official investigations are complete, a clairvoyant concludes that arson was the cause, accuses a former employee of the grand hotel of being the culprit and indirectly casts serious suspicion on the hotel manager at the time. Despite a multitude of clues and suspects, the arson case remains unsolved and the investigation is called off. Yet the fire continues to haunt the former hotel manager.

With the heart of the spa town destroyed, a part of his own life has also been shattered, and the clairvoyant’s accusation that the Grand Hotel must have burned down because of him has turned his idyllic world upside down. Although he does not believe in fortune-telling, he is firmly convinced that his former employee set the fire out of revenge against him.

Much to the dismay of his wife Sally, 30 years after the fire, he attempts to reopen the case with the help of a friend, a major in the Graubünden cantonal police force. He hopes the inspector might uncover overlooked clues and finally free him from his burden. But the inspector bases his work on facts, not interpretations. Consequently, alongside a strange mountaineer and the former employee, the hotel manager himself also comes under the scrutiny of the investigation. This forces him to come to terms with reality and face the truth.

Autumn Fire – The Grandhotel Waldhaus Fire [Original version with subtitles/Original version with German subtitles] CH 2026, Dir: Roman Vital, Genre: Crime/Thriller/Documentary, Original languages: German/Romansh/English, 114 mins.

Followed by a Q&A with the filmmakers (Screenplay/Director: Roman Vital, Cinematographer: Knut Schmitz (BVK), Historian: Jochen Ziegelmann).