Topol is a short essay film in which director Lisa Vogel travels to her grandmother’s village of
origin in present-day Slovenia, formerly part of Yugoslavia. Through quiet, observational images of
the rural landscape, the film unfolds as a personal exploration of memory, origin, and
estrangement.
Layered over these images, Vogel reflects on the emotional distance between herself and her
father’s family, a silence that has shaped their relationships across generations. As the journey
progresses, fragments of family history gradually emerge, revealing the persistence of fascist
ideologies that continue to inform the family’s structures and dynamics to this day.
Moving between past and present, proximity and distance, Topol becomes a meditation on what
is spoken and what remains unspoken, and on how political histories inscribe themselves into
intimate spaces.
