LENI RIEFENSTAHL
Name: Helene Berta Amalie Riefenstahl
Born: 22 August 1902 Berlin, Germany
Died: 8 September 2003 Pöcking, Germany
Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl (August 22, 1902 – September 8, 2003)
was a German film director, dancer and actress widely noted for her aesthetics
and innovations as a filmmaker. Her most famous film was Triumph des Willens (Triumph
of the Will), a propaganda film made at the 1934 Nuremberg congress of the Nazi
Party. Riefenstahl's prominence in the Third Reich along with her personal
friendships with Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels thwarted her film career
following Germany's defeat in World War II, after which she was arrested but
never convicted of war crimes.
The propaganda value of her films made during the 1930s repels most commentators
but many film histories cite the aesthetics as outstanding. After her
death the Associated Press described Riefenstahl as an "acclaimed pioneer of
film and photographic techniques." Der Tagesspiegel newspaper in Berlin noted,
"Leni Riefenstahl conquered new ground in the cinema." The BBC said her
documentaries "were hailed as groundbreaking film-making, pioneering techniques
involving cranes, tracking rails, and many cameras working at the same time."
Reviewer Gary Morris called Riefenstahl "an artist of unparalleled gifts, a
woman in an industry dominated by men, one of the great formalists of the cinema
on a par with Eisenstein or Welles." Riefenstahl later published her still
photography of the Nuba tribes in Africa and made films of marine life.
Name: Helene Berta Amalie Riefenstahl
Born: 22 August 1902 Berlin, Germany
Died: 8 September 2003 Pöcking, Germany
Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl (August 22, 1902 – September 8, 2003)
was a German film director, dancer and actress widely noted for her aesthetics
and innovations as a filmmaker. Her most famous film was Triumph des Willens (Triumph
of the Will), a propaganda film made at the 1934 Nuremberg congress of the Nazi
Party. Riefenstahl's prominence in the Third Reich along with her personal
friendships with Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels thwarted her film career
following Germany's defeat in World War II, after which she was arrested but
never convicted of war crimes.
The propaganda value of her films made during the 1930s repels most commentators
but many film histories cite the aesthetics as outstanding. After her
death the Associated Press described Riefenstahl as an "acclaimed pioneer of
film and photographic techniques." Der Tagesspiegel newspaper in Berlin noted,
"Leni Riefenstahl conquered new ground in the cinema." The BBC said her
documentaries "were hailed as groundbreaking film-making, pioneering techniques
involving cranes, tracking rails, and many cameras working at the same time."
Reviewer Gary Morris called Riefenstahl "an artist of unparalleled gifts, a
woman in an industry dominated by men, one of the great formalists of the cinema
on a par with Eisenstein or Welles." Riefenstahl later published her still
photography of the Nuba tribes in Africa and made films of marine life.