Zerrissen - Mein teures Dörflein Mühlen

The small village of Mühlen in Taufers, as peaceful and quiet as it appeared to the outside world, was to go down in history. It became the linchpin of the resistance fighters in the Pustertal against the Italian denationalization policy and for an appropriate solution to the South Tyrolean question. Men and women from Mühlen were involved as co-thinkers, guardians of political resistance actions and rebelled against the non-implementation of genuine autonomy; other citizens, on the other hand, clearly distanced themselves from this, sided not least with the Italian forces of order and were thus confronted with exclusion and hostility. In this respect, Mühlen in Taufers reflects the big in the small, specifically how the Italian denationalisation policy on the one hand and the activism against this policy on the other became a friction tree and divided an entire village community, indeed entire families and circles of friends. In Mühlen, for example, this became visible in the dissolution or reunification of the local music band.
The documentary is dedicated to the questions of how it came about that Mühlen in Taufers became the centre of political activism in the Puster Valley and how various citizens of Mühlen were involved in it or clearly isolated themselves from it. The story is told around the central figure Rosa Ebner. She, a simple saleswoman from the countryside, wrote in many letters about how she experienced this politically heated situation in Mühlen in Taufers. Determined, she fought against the injustices in exchanges with the "Puschtra Buibm", pointed out incorrect representations in the reporting on South Tyrol to chief editors of German-language newspapers in Austria and Germany, and cultivated contact with South Tyrolean and Austrian politicians, including Bruno Kreisky. "Rosa Ebner had become a symbol of revolt against injustice and, for many people in South Tyrol, the conscience of the country," reads an obituary on the occasion of her passing in 2009. Even today, the many letters in Rosa Ebner's estate bear witness to the fact that she gave everything for her homeland, for those who were tortured and imprisoned, and the least for herself. Since she also lived in North Tyrol for a while, the contacts also lead there. In this documentary film, the estate of Rosa Ebner, which is in the possession of Martha Stocker, is published for the first time.