Lausanne, Switzerland. A group of young people decide to make a movie. Intrigued by their dream, a social worker decides to help them write a script. Once that is done, they head off on the road towards Cannes to try and sell their project to producers.

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The story of this film is less important than the story behind the film: created thanks to a crowdfunding site, Tapis rouge gained its strength and energy from a young improvisation group who dreamed of making a movie. For his first feature film, which was shot on a tight schedule, Fred Baillif mixes reality with fiction, drama and comedy, both social documentary and a typical road movie – punctuated with adventure, disputes, confessions, with a restrained but sunny happy end. The script lacks any clear stakes, rests too much on the contrived clash between oversimplified characters, but the energy that moves Tapis rouge makes it heartfelt, which in itself is hard to resist.