Fertilia, a city founded in Sardinia that due to the outbreak of the Second World War remained incomplete and with few inhabitants, mostly Venetian and Ferrarese settlers who reclaimed the surrounding marshes.

Chioggia, a flotilla of fishing boats arrived from the nearby Istria carrying on board 53 families of refugees fleeing from communist Yugoslavia, which obtained from the Peace Treaty of 10 February 1947 a large part of those lands where the communist partisan army carried out the massacres of the foibe.

In the spring of 1948, those fishing boats circumnavigated Italy and brought to Fertilia an entire community that integrated, rolled up its sleeves and contributed to making that town in northern Sardinia an example of inclusion, resilience and rebirth.

In the summer of 2023, however, a boat, Klizia , retraces that journey with second-generation exiles on board, who have begun an identity journey aimed at rediscovering and valorizing the origins of Fertilia with the Egean Ecomuseum dedicated to the exodus, and the exile Giulio Marongiu, who after leaving Pola as a child never returned to his hometown.

A journey that, after engaging and captivating Julian-Dalmatian exiles, Italians from the indigenous community in Istria, and a growing number of people intrigued by this story, has become a documentary film produced by Time Multimedia, thanks also to the contributions of the National Association of Venezia Giulia and Dalmatia, the Multimedia Documentation Center of Julian, Istrian, Rijeka, and Dalmatian Culture, and the Federation of Associations of Istrian, Rijeka, and Dalmatian Exiles. The documentary film was presented yesterday at the Villa Giffoni Hub on the Venice Lido during a collateral event at the 81st Venice Film Festival, and will soon be broadcast on Rai Cultura: Route 230° Return to the Land of the Fathers.

"After decades of silence, the history of the eastern Italian border is increasingly at the center of attention also in the cinematographic field - observed the President of FederEsuli Renzo Codarin - and thanks to documentaries like this it becomes easier for us too to explain where we come from, how our integration took place in the places where we arrived as refugees and what relationship we have with our land of origin and with the Italians who still live there"

Along the same lines of thought is Roberto Ciambetti, President of the Regional Council of Veneto, who considers “Rotta 230°” «a wonderful testimony, a documentary to be shown in all schools because it tells with simplicity not only the story of an incredible journey, but also the events of the Adriatic border that have affected tens of thousands of our fellow countrymen»

Interviewed by Alessandro Cuk (film critic and president of the ANVGD Committee of Venice), the entire Klizia crew could not miss the premiere: captain Giulio Marongiu, his son Federico, Giuseppe Bellu, and Mauro Manca, who also recounted this journey in a book ( Rotta 230° Ritorno alla terra dei padri. Diario di bordo ) and has just published another book, Fertilia tra inclusione e rinascita. Storia della prima città europea , both published by Panoramika.

Everyone was very excited, happy and incredulous to see their story told by the expert direction of Igor Biddau, with the voices of two first-rate voice actors, Roberto Pedicini and Alina Person: the latter in particular gave voice to Federica Picone, the actress who played a mermaid who accompanied Giulio on his return to Pola after almost 80 years of exile. A fairy-tale touch to illustrate a journey through time and space, in search of one's origins and identity.

Lorenzo Salimbeni