Hollywood contract. In 1986, Swaim wrote and directed Half Moon Street, adapted from Paul Theroux's award-winning novel Doctor Slaughter. The film starred Sigourney Weaver and Michael Caine and introduced French actor Vincent Lindon. Swaim, now in Hollywood, signed a contract with MGM as a director, writer, and producer in 1987. There he developed several projects for MGM and directed Masquerade for the studio in 1988, starring Rob Lowe and Meg Tilly. Disenchanted with Hollywood and the studio system, Swaim returned to France where he set up a company to develop European projects for American producers. In 1989, Swaim left for Rome where he spent two years writing and directing L'Atlantide for Italian producer Roberto Ciccuto. The 19th century adventure drama, shot in Studio 5 at Cinecittà in Rome and in the southern desert of Morocco, starred Tchéky Karyo, Jean Rochefort, Anna Galiena and Fernando Rey. After L'Atlantide, Swaim went back to Paris and for the next few years developed Police-Secrets, a television series for France Télévisions. The series, consisting of twelve 90-minute films, was one of the first realistic police dramas on French television. It set the tone and pace for the numerous French police series which followed. Apart from writing and producing the series, Swaim also directed several 90 minute films for France Télévision and Canal+. In 1997, Swaim returned to the movies, directing The Climb (1997–1998) starring John Hurt and David Strathairn. The film was one of Swaim's most critically acclaimed films, winning prizes in numerous festivals including the UNICEF Prize for Best Film at the Berlin Film Festival. Swaim then adapted Giovanni's Room, the American novel by James Baldwin, for James Ivory and Ismail Merchant. In 2001, Gerard Mortier, director of the Salzburg Festival, asked Swaim to direct the Leoš Janáček opera, Jenůfa with Hildegard Behrens and Karita Mattila, and with John Eliot Gardiner conducting. The opera was the critical and popular success of the festival. The following year, Swaim began working on his first comedy, Cheap Shot. The film went into production in 2003 and was released in the summer of 2004 under the name Nos Amis les Flics. The film, starring Daniel Auteuil, Frédéric Diefenthal and Lorant Deutsch, won the Grand Prix du Festival de Saint-Malo that year. Aside from writing, directing and producing, Swaim has acted in several films, including John Landis's Spies Like Us, Caroline Huppert's J'ai Deux Amours, James Ivory's A Soldier's