Leni Riefenstahl dies at 101.

mike65 · 09-09-2003 11:03pm #1

Film-maker Leni Riefenstahl dies

Riefenstahl's propaganda films pioneered new techniques
Controversial film-maker Leni Riefenstahl, who made the Nazi propaganda film Triumph of the Will, has died aged 101.

Riefenstahl became a favourite of German dictator Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, making films for his fascist regime.

Her most famous work was Triumph of the Will, a propaganda film showing a Nazi rally in Nuremberg in 1934.

She was never a Nazi party member, and never charged at a war crimes tribunal.

Her death was reported on the online version of German magazine Bunte. Her longtime companion Horst Kettner said she had "quietly fallen asleep" at her home in the Bavarian town of Poecking on Monday afternoon.

Riefenstahl also made the film Olympia, a documentary on the Berlin Olympics of 1936. Critics said her work glorified a regime responsible for the deaths of millions.

But she was adamant she was not a supporter of the Nazis, and had done the films for art and not politics.

'Documentary, not propaganda'

"I was only interested in how I could make a film that was not stupid like a crude propagandist newsreel, but more interesting", she once told BBC News Online.

"It reflects the truth as it was then, in 1934. It is a documentary, not propaganda."

Her Nazi documentaries were hailed as groundbreaking film-making, pioneering techniques involving cranes, tracking rails, and many cameras working at the same time.

Riefenstahl kept working until the end of her life

But only last year, Riefenstahl was investigated for Holocaust denial after she said she was unaware that Gypsies which had been taken from concentration camps to be used as extras in one of her wartime films had later died in the camps.

Riefenstahl began her career as an actress - Hitler was said to have been captivated by her appearance in the film The Blue Light.

After the war she was unable to find work in films, and turned to photography. She was celebrated for her work on the disappearing Nuba tribe in the Sudan.

In her 70s, she took up scuba-diving to help with back pain. She released a film, Impressions Under Water, in 2002, compiled from over 200 dives. It was widely acclaimed.

Easily the most controversial film maker so far and one of the most influential maybe she should get a mention on the Best Directors thread).

I dont have any particular reaction to her death except to hope that one of the channels will be willing to show some of her work. Its all very well talking about dangerous propaganda but I'd like the chance to judge for myself.

Does anyone know if Olympia or Triumph... have ever been shown on TV?.

Mike.

Spacedog · 10-09-2003 5:14am

It was reported that she also filmed black athletes suceeding in the olympics held in berlin much to Hitlers dismay and well as her later photography carear where she photographed african tribes, some amazing pictures. She's certainly a facinating character.

TheDuke · 16-09-2003 6:43pm

indeed, she created some real master pieces - the visuals and the impressivness of the 'message' considering 30's technology is just amazing.

I know there is always this 'moral' nagging with the knowledge we have today when talking about 'Triumf of Will', etc. - but switch off the head, sit back, think of living in the early 30's before any of the atrocities where know or had started ... and watch.

It is such a shame it was for such an evil regime - in the right hands she could have become one of the worlds star directors...

The Duke : ))

SweetBirdOfTruth · 17-09-2003 10:40am

Originally posted by Spacedog
It was reported that she also filmed black athletes suceeding in the olympics held in berlin much to Hitlers dismay and well as her later photography carear where she photographed african tribes, some amazing pictures. She's certainly a facinating character.

hitler's dismay is stretching it. he refused to shake owen's hand, but then so too did the american president.

as for her nuba photographs, susan sntag has famously pointed out that they merely perpetuate the infatuation riefenstahl had for fascism, as evidenced by the the triumph and olympia films.

regardless, riefenstahl has had an amazing influence on later generations of film makers.

ObeyGiant · 17-09-2003 1:57pm

Originally posted by SweetBirdOfTruth
as for her nuba photographs, susan sntag has famously pointed out that they merely perpetuate the infatuation riefenstahl had for fascism, as evidenced by the the triumph and olympia films.

I find it hard to accept that one can present Triumph of the Wills and Olympia as "evidence" of her "infatuation with fascism". Her own argument is that the "fascist aesthetics" she has been accused of portraying in these films were there to begin with, and her job as documentary filmmaker (for the Nazi party) was simply to document them. Indeed, from both of the films that you have mentioned, nothing particularly stands out about Riefenstahl's filmmaking; the only thing that makes them important (contextually, if nothing else) what was being filmed.

James Faris wrote a much more balanced article about Riefenstahl's work, even addressing many of Sontag's accusations. One point he makes is particularly interesting - in linking aesthetics to politics, one runs into all kinds of trouble, not least of which being the danger of completely dismissing the "cultural productions of all oppressive regimes", such as the pyramids of Giza or the Bastille.

TheDuke · 17-09-2003 2:09pm

hear, hear .... point well made ObeyGiant

SweetBirdOfTruth · 17-09-2003 2:21pm

Originally posted by ObeyGiant
Indeed, from both of the films that you have mentioned, nothing particularly stands out about Riefenstahl's filmmaking; the only thing that makes them important (contextually, if nothing else) what was being filmed.

uuuuummmm ... weeeeeellll ... technically, they were ahead of their time, the manner of their making introduced new ways of doing things, freed the camera up from ebing stuck in a spot on a tripod and introduced a fluidity to the filming that had not been there before ... so context/subject aside, she has been amazingly influential.

in freeing the camera up, she showed a whole new way of looking at things, on screen (eg a simple little thing like filming tthe shot with the camera at the foot of the athelete). and that way of looking at things was also a look at what she saw, which is not necessarily what everyone/anyone else saw.

no documenatry maker is neutral, it is impossible to be neutral, to be neutral is itself to take a position. plenty of people in her day were swayed, awed by fascism, including people we love and respect today such as wb yeats. leni was naive/faux-naif in her persistent rejection of this accusation. personally, that is the only sin i hold against her.

ObeyGiant · 17-09-2003 3:16pm

Originally posted by SweetBirdOfTruth
freed the camera up from ebing stuck in a spot on a tripod and introduced a fluidity to the filming that had not been there before ... so context/subject aside, she has been amazingly influential.

If there was any possible way to find out just how many directors have been credited with inventing (or even 'pioneering') this technique, I'd love to find out.
Personally, using the all-powerful Google, I can also find it ascribed to Murnau, Eisenstein, Pabst, and Lang.

Although perhaps my use of the word "only" in "the only thing that makes them important" was a little bit more dismissive than I meant. After all, if it wasn't for Triumph of the Wills, Star Wars' "Empire" would have looked like a bunch of pussies.

Originally posted by SweetBirdOfTruth
no documenatry maker is neutral, it is impossible to be neutral, to be neutral is itself to take a position ... leni was naive/faux-naif in her persistent rejection of this accusation. personally, that is the only sin i hold against her.

This wasn't what I was trying to say. I was not trying to present her as a completely neutral, objective film-maker. As a matter of fact, in this, I completely agree with you - I find her denial of any knowledge of what was happening in Nazi Germany to be a little bit unnerving (especially since she acknowledges that she used prisoners from a concentration camp as extras in one of her films).

My point was simply that I find it hard to accept that anyone can present Olympia and Triumph of the Wills as evidence of her "infatuation with fascism" any more than people could present my job as evidence of my "infatuation with broken computers" (a little facetious, perhaps). In both of these films, she was requested to simply document the spectacle presented by the Nazi party.

SweetBirdOfTruth · 17-09-2003 3:25pm

if she had "simply" documented, i'd think you had a point - she didn't do it simply

ObeyGiant · 17-09-2003 7:41pm

Originally posted by SweetBirdOfTruth
if she had "simply" documented, i'd think you had a point - she didn't do it simply

When working for a patron, it's generally not a great idea to disappoint them. Especially when your patron is Adolf Hitler. To use my own job as an analogy once more - that I do my job well does not confim my love of broken computers, only that I don't want to be fired.

In Riefenstahl's case, replace "fired" with "executed" or something.

SweetBirdOfTruth · 18-09-2003 12:53am

there's also a difference between clocking the hours and working overtime to get the job done. i think both films rise about the label of "documentary" and that that is principally down to leni - that is not a criticism of her, that is actually praise. i do like this woman.

re Murnau, Eisenstein, Pabst, and Lang - eisenstein brought in cutting techniques, lang moved the camera, each added something new. leni brought in roller skating cameramen goddamit!!!

(they were all working around the same time - is the same as crediting joyce with the invention of the modern novel, or the praise eliot gets for the waste land - in part they took half-worked ideas of some of the contemporaries, but stamped their name all over it by bringing it off with such panache). would these techniques have evolved without leni? quite probably, but the point is, she was (if you'll excuse the management-speak cliche) thinking and operating outside the box.

Clintons Cat · 18-09-2003 3:21pm

Olympia

An interesting article on the Art V Propaganda debate.

When Triumph of the will was made ,the National Socialists had already attained a popular following.he Sixth nuremberg rally was a celebration of Hiters accenscion to chancellorship.
Hitler Goebells and Speer meticulously worked out the crowd dynamic's over the many previous rallys both at nuremberg and all over Germany in smaller events,Riefenstahl may have captured those events in the best light,but she was not ultimately responsible for them.

Leni Riefenstahl dies at 101.

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