''O, Vrba'' is a key Slovene pre-war

documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

. It was commissioned by the Educational Union (), directed by and produced in 1941 under the auspice of the company Emona Film. Its first internal premiere took place in the beginning of 1942. Due to the so-called "

cultural silence Cultural silence () was the boycott, ordered in January 1942 by the communist-dominated Slovene Liberation Front (OF), of all cultural activities and events connected with the German and Italian annexation of Slovenia because the Axis powers autho ...

" imposed in the

Slovene Lands The Slovene lands or Slovenian lands ( or in short ) is the historical denomination for the territories in Central and Southern Europe where people primarily spoke Slovene. The Slovene lands were part of the Illyrian provinces, the Austrian Empi ...

during World War II, it was released only in 1945 by the State Film Company. It is a short

black and white film Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white to produce a range of achromatic brightnesses of grey. It is also known as greyscale in technical settings. Media The history of various visual media began with black and white, a ...

that shows the

Prešeren House The Prešeren House (traditional Slovene language, Slovene oeconym ) is a house in the village of Vrba, Slovenia, Vrba in the Municipality of Žirovnica in Slovenia. It is the house where the Slovenes, Slovene poet France Prešeren was born in 180 ...

after it was opened as a museum, on the day when the authors found out about the German assault on Poland, reflected in a dark atmosphere of clouds traversing the

Karawanks The Karawanks or Karavankas or Karavanks (; , ) are a mountain range of the Southern Limestone Alps on the border between Slovenia to the south and Austria to the north. With a total length of in an east–west direction, the Karawanks chain is o ...

. The film reflects Förster's fine feel for light and composition. It contains voice recordings of the writer

Fran Saleški Finžgar Fran Saleški Finžgar (February 9, 1871 – June 2, 1962) was perhaps the most popular Slovenes, Slovene folk writer. He is particularly known for his novels and short stories, although he also wrote poems and plays. Life Fran Saleški Finžgar ...

, who led the arrangement of the house, and of the poet

Oton Župančič Oton Župančič (; January 23, 1878 – June 11, 1949; pseudonym ''Gojko'' ) was a Slovene language, Slovene poet, translator, and playwright. He is regarded, alongside Ivan Cankar, Dragotin Kette and Josip Murn, as the beginner of modernism in ...

, who recited the Prešeren's poem

O Vrba "O Vrba" is a sonnet written in 1832 and later corrected by the Slovene Romantic poet France Prešeren, who is considered the national poet of Slovenia. It was published in 1834 in the fourth volume of the almanac ''Krajnska čbelica'' (Carniol ...

. The music, written by , was the first original Slovene film music. The montage and mixing of sound and picture were done by .

References

1945 films Documentary films about poets France Prešeren 1945 short documentary films Slovenian short documentary films Documentary films about Yugoslavia {{Slovenia-film-stub