Wanda (Agnieszka Grochowska) is a Polish woman employed as a carer for 70-year-old Swiss Joseph, a rich industrialist who is bedridden after a stroke. Apparently, Wanda has been working for this family for some time and she is also the housekeeper for Joseph’s wife Elsa (Martha Keller), and their younger son Gregi is obviously in love with her. However, it will soon become clear to us why Wanda is “wonderful”, especially for old Joža. Although he is barely mobile and can only get out of bed with someone else’s help, the voluptuous old man also uses Wanda’s sexual services, for which he charges decently. Wanda, on the other hand, needs every franc to feed her family in Poland, and although this humorous drama / tragicomedy even started well, it drowned too quickly in the stereotypical depictions of rich Westerners and poor Easterners who, if necessary, fuck immobile old men by the fist euros or in this case francs.
The whole situation will turn into an additional circus when Wanda, who already has two sons in Poland, becomes pregnant after a one-night visit to her old woman. When Josef’s family finds out what happened, total chaos ensues. His daughter Sophie will also appear, Wanda’s family will arrive in Switzerland, and what may have been humorous and meaningful at the beginning will be diluted into a sugary and overly sugary dramedy about the conflict between East and West, differences, similarities and everything that normally falls into the formula of such films. Bettina Oberli’s film premiered at the festival in Tribeca, and “Wanda, mein Wunder” was also nominated for the Swiss film of the year.
Although at first it may seem that this family really loves and appreciates Wanda, it will soon become clear to us that this family of rich snobbish bourgeois has let the caregiver know where she belongs. As soon as they accidentally find money with her, they will automatically think that Wanda stole it, and although this may not have been the intention of the author, the entire dynamic of the film mainly revolves around this exploitation of the differences between East and West and the standard stereotypes in which Westerners still work with they see the east of Europe as some wild, primitive barbarians who are only thinking about how to steal them. As wretched and poor people who still live in mud houses with animals while they are enlightened, spiritualized, civilized and incredibly smart and capable.