Bela Koprena

Ziga Ciber

Ireland / 2025 / Documentary / 9’53”I2600993

Bela Koprena
BO Visionner Images

SYNOPSIS

Nestled by the banks of the Soča River, the village of Anhovo carries a legacy buried beneath layers of history and dust. More than 100 years ago, an asbestos cement factory was built. Through shifting wars, regimes, and borders from fascism, socialism, and capitalism. From Italy, Yugoslavia, to Slovenia, the factory endured. It gave people jobs, homes and hope. But soon, it began to take their breath, their health, and eventually, their lives. Today, it is still belching smoke, as time stands still under the White Veil. The film gives voice to those silenced by progress and asks what remains when the skies clear.____________________________________________________________________ As a child of the 90s, I remember living with a quiet, persistent fear in my head. The fear of asbestos roof panels that still cover countless buildings in my hometown, decades after their use was banned. Years later, as a mechanical engineering student working in a thermal power plant, we were tasked with demolishing several old structures under the plant’s jurisdiction. These buildings were still roofed with asbestos-cement panels, known as "salonitke". One of my coworkers, younger than me, broke them apart with almost alarming enthusiasm. I put on a mask, stepped back, and tried to explain to him just how dangerous that was. He dismissed my concern, saying asbestos had simply lost its market value, and so “they had to make something up” he said that’s how the idea of it being carcinogenic was born. And with that, he went back to smashing the panels to dust. Even years later, the memory clings to me as if it happened yesterday. My grandfather, sadly, died of lung cancer. He was a smoker, but he also spent his free time crafting gutters, often working directly on asbestos rooftops. Today, asbestos remains present in millions of buildings across Europe; over 250 million were built before it was banned, and new EU directives aim to protect millions of workers who will one day remove those roofs. Asbestos is not just a problem of the past. It’s a heavy inheritance for both our present and future generations.

GÉNÉRIQUE