Pilije

In balmy weather, under pleasant sunshine, two boys in a park are standing behind a slide projector, looking at photographic examples of the craftsmanship particular to the region. In the background we hear a German-language Carinthian song, classically performed by a male choir, whose image soon fills the screen. The men in Pleamle-patterned waistcoats sing of the Rosental Valley, which is the locale of the town of Ferlach/Borovlje, famous for its gunsmithing – a remote corner of the world where bangs and echoes resound.

The scenes with which Samira Fux maps out the landscape are tranquil, often nearly idyllic. Her interviewees from the gunsmith trade give appreciative and affectionate accounts of their work, some romanticizing it, with others ranging from sad to joyful. They talk about their family histories, the impact of globalization on business, the Nazi era, and the partisan struggle of resistance in World War Two. The bilingual identity in Carinthia/Koroška, and the political complexity passed down with it, resonates throughout the film. At the same time, the interviews in PILIJE – and Maria-Lisa Pichler’s very sensitive editing – also reveal how this bilingualism can be accepted as a matter of course when people choose to do so.

As voiceover narrator, the director is also part of the story; she is present. Her commentary places the individual descriptions in a larger context.

One distinguishing feature of PILIJE (“the gunsmiths”) is the way in which it sensitively discloses certain long-held ambivalences. The filmmaker does not judge: she looks and listens closely, and through the finely crafted contextualization of different or diverging positions, the full complexity of Koroška/Carinthia as a border region is revealed. No microcosm can counter this, regardless of how highly specialized and internationally recognized an industry niche such as Ferlach’s gunsmithing is. “You also live off your imagination,” says one of the gunsmiths. Analytically, he hits the nail on the head. (Melanie Letschnig) 

Translation: John Wojtowicz