The separatist tensions in the South Tyrol of the 1960s are largely forgotten in view of the decades of peace in the popular tourism region. Director Michael Kofler, who himself comes from a rural area in South Tyrol, now gives this chapter cinematic visibility. His feature film “Secondaryland“Dive deeply into this charged time: Due to the continuing disadvantage of the German -speaking population in South Tyrol, which despite a special autonomy status after the end of Italian fascism, separatists in 1961 committed a series of bombings on electricity pylons.
In the middle of this historical escalation, however, Kofler does not put the strategies or ideology of the movement into the center, but the inner life of a torn farming family. With a sensitive look for social upheavals and personal dilemmata, “second country” tells of family responsibility and bond, of inner tornness as well as hatred and violence, which are slowly but unstoppable into the souls of the figures. The film deliberately dispenses with large political statements, rather Kofler is interested in his feature film debut for the small gestures of resistance, for ambivalence. He skillfully works out the speechlessness and the mutual lack of understanding between the ethnic groups. What arises is a gripping family drama with political depth of field – and a depressing topicality.
The differences between the brothers Paul (Thomas Prenn) and Anton (Laurence Rupp) are reinforced by the political tensions in South Tyrol.
Paul (Thomas Prenn) is a young man with artistic ambitions, who feels increasingly isolated in the village community in South Tyrol, in which he grew up. When he stands in the employment office in nearby Bolzano with his best friend Hans (Fabian Mair Mitterer) in the queue, the hoped -for spots once again go to Italian applicants. This displeasure has a system, and the frustration sits deeply with both – although Hans continues to strive for a future at home and is also ready to fight for it, while Paul has received a promise for studying art and, unlike his father, wants to escape the village. But then the so -called fire night takes place. Paul's brother Anton (Laurence Rupp) has to immerse themselves in the demolition of the electricity pylons, Hans is captured and tortured by the Italian police. Now Paul is forced to stay in the village and, together with his sister -in -law Anna (Aenne Schwarz), to take care of his brother's farm and son.
Michael Kofler's “second country” tries to transport a feeling of the narrow. The valley in which Paul lives with Anton and Anna is geographically wide, but emotionally claustrophobic. It is a place of language boundaries, mutual distrust – between the German -speaking rural population on the one hand and the Italian fellow citizens and the state on the other. When dozens of electricity pylons explode, this is not the beginning, but the culmination point of radicalization that used long before.
There is no black or white here
From the beginning, the three central figures are introduced as personalities with complex relationships with each other. So the relationship between the brothers is characterized by respect, but also by competing thinking and a hard childhood with a retiring father. And Anna, who is not really accepted by the village community as a married person, is a woman that was very progressive for that time. So she tries to dialogue with the Italian population, while her husband Anton is committed to violent resistance.
Thomas Prenn (“Great Freedom”, “Biohackers”) is the calm protagonist of the film in the role of Paul. He dreams of studying art in Munich, but at the same time feels responsible for the courtyard – and is thus increasingly ripped off between loyalty and longing. Anton, on the other hand, is embodied by Laurence Rupp (“Veni Vidi Vici”) with the pride of an undisputed, conservative head of the family and a certain hardness. But instead of demonizing him, the film also shows the disappointment behind its actions – the outrage over unequal treatment, the fainting of a man who had to take responsibility too early due to the alcoholism of the father and no longer feels appropriate within society. His wife Anna is the advanced, but nevertheless not anachronistic soul of the family: Aenne Schwarz (“Leibniz”) gives her a silence with which she is against the escalating hatred and is increasingly isolated herself.
Use dialogue instead of violence and not only makes friends in the village community: Anton's wife Anna (Aenne Schwarz).
Kofler and cameraman Felix Wiedemann put up close: the hand camera stays on the faces, follows movements through dark stables, smoky village economies, barren kitchens. The political background remain present in the subtext instead of being impossible to be imparted didactically. The oppressed feelings of Paul and Anna, who have to put their wishes back on the well -being of Anton and have to work for the well -being of the courtyard and the family, are underlined by the confines of the pictures. For example, when Paul draws alone in the barn at night, next to the covered wooden sculptures of the late father. Or if Anna herself is increasingly pushed out of the village community through contact with an Italian -born teacher.
The film does not draw a hero epic, not a precise picture of the struggle for independence, but a tragic spiral for the population and the individual family members: This is how the radicalization and anxiety suffer violence and a climate of fear ultimately all people in hostile, regardless of their views. The film avoids a clear attitude to the independence question of South Tyrol – which makes it particularly up to date. Because even today we experience how democracies falter when dialogue is replaced by volume and differences are built up to enemy images.
Conclusion: “Secondary Land” is a moving family drama against the background of the South Tyrolean separatist movement and an impressive reflection on political violence and its consequences. Michael Kofler succeeds in a sensitive family portrait that convincingly interweaves a personal story of two brothers with a historical conflict.
We saw “second land” at the Munich Film Festival in 2025, where the film in the “Competition Cinecro” series celebrated its world premiere.