Elena Fischli manages Karl Saurer’s estate. In an interview, you talk about the importance of the film “The Dream of the Big Blue Water”, which you worked on at the time.
VICTOR KÄLIN
One month before the vote for the new Etzelwerk concession, the restored Sihlsee film by Karl Saurer from 1993 “The Dream of the Big Blue Water” returns to the cinema. Isn’t the proximity to the voting date by chance? In fact, I am very pleased that the newly beautifully restored film can be seen on the big screen just in time before the voting in the districts of Einsiedeln and Höfe. From the beginning of November there will be screenings at the Cineboxx Einsiedeln.
In preparation for the vote, detailed information was provided on facts and figures on water tariffs, residual water volumes, reduced electricity purchases for the region, flood protection and infrastructure responsibilities related to the new concession.
The film provides a precious, sensual and visible background. With disturbing images and contemporary testimonies, it offers a concrete insight into the history of the formation of this basin, the largest in Switzerland in terms of surface. Let’s first find out how the Sihlsee and the hydroelectric power plant were born. Specifically: Is “The Dream of the Big Blue Water” a voting recommendation for November 27? I find a particular strength of Karl Saurer’s films that all of his films are both political and poetic, but always aim to give the viewer space for their own questions, thoughts and decisions. With “Found objects and fragments of an upper valley story” – the subtitle of the film – he wanted to show the ideas, the driving forces, the conflicts and the victims that have made our present what it is. The film documents disputes over Lake Sihl from initial designs in the late 19th century to the early 1990s. Karl Saurer believed it was necessary to know the past when making decisions in the present, especially when one goes far into the future.
You describe the film as a “legacy of this region”. Can you elaborate on this statement?
One of the most drastic changes in this landscape was so powerfully captured. Valuable historical evidence shows how a previously inhabited and cultivated valley has become a lake. The vivid descriptions of the people directly affected bring us closer to the big intervention. Many people today no longer know that more than a hundred farms have had to give way to the lake and that more than 1,700 people have been resettled or lost their land. Karl Saurer is almost as old as Lake Sihl … When Karl Saurer was born in Gross, the lake was only six years old. The stories of the flooded valley and sunken houses accompanied him for decades. Eventually, it became an emotional concern to track down witnesses who were still alive and have future generations tell what it was like to leave the house and farm or build the lake.
In this way, memories and precious sources could be saved from impending loss and oblivion. The word was given to people who otherwise would hardly have it. A complex story has become clear and understandable. Karl Saurer’s “archaeological” interest has always been at the service of a better analysis of the political and structural processes that control the present and the future. The film silently and yet unequivocally questions the value of progress: who paid what price? What was left out? How should we use our resources in the future?
And where is Karl Saurer located?
In a subtle way, Karl Saurer captured the tension between the fascination with technology and industrial progress on the one hand and resistance to the loss of nature and homeland on the other. Thus ends in 2022 with the debates on the security of supply, wind turbines, nuclear power plants, the production of CO2 neutral energy with hydroelectric energy and the appeal to electricity savings …
Another strong point of his films is that he prefers to discover and discover something in a so-called little concrete story that turns out to be fundamental. He is often able to come across and point out something that is perhaps more complete and exciting and remains meaningful for a longer period of time. Here he understood immediately that the time would come when water, a vital resource, could be reconsidered and re-evaluated. And that the great question of the balance between the use and protection of natural “treasures” remains a central and vital concern.
As a longtime partner and contributor to many of his screenplays, you manage the legacy of Karl Saurer. How was the technical quality of the film? It was in poor condition which could hardly be proved. Due to intensive use, the 16 mm copies were no longer good and some of the rolls stored in the Cinémathèque Lausanne were already suffering from acetic acid syndrome. Karl Saurer died in the midst of preparations for restoration and redigitalization. With the help of regional, cantonal and private support, it has now been possible to “raise” the funding. Two experts who had already restored Fredi M. Murer films did a great rescue job! We have also created English and French subtitles for this version.
Is there interest in the film outside the region? In light of today’s developments, the film has become surprisingly current and exemplary. Now it is experiencing a real “revival”. After Einsiedeln, many cinemas in Switzerland want to show it. The focus is not just on the energy debate, but also on the fact that many concessions for hydroelectric power plants in other cantons will expire in the next decade, so the topic is moving people’s minds far beyond our region. This extensive effort, which I did not expect, shows me that the efforts to preserve the film were worth it! And what are you waiting for more? Personally, I am very pleased that through this film many successive generations, those who have recently moved to Einsiedeln and its surroundings, or visitors can experience a lively and multifaceted history of this beautiful area – and perhaps get an idea of the price that previous generations they paid for this jewel of the lake, lying there as if it had always been here.
Elena Fischli is the executor of Karl Saurer’s work. Here together in the photo on the occasion of the culture award ceremony in 2018.
Photo: EA Archives
