Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2002/01/10

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Leni Riefenstahl Site
From: Hans-Peter.Lammerich@t-online.de
Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 00:23:46 +0100
References: <200201102045.MAA18431@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>

These early alpine silent movies featuring Germanian hereos in Wagnerian
style certainly are pioneering work. But for doing outdoor shooting
rather than story. 

Leni Riefenstahl chiefly is remembered for her coverage of the Nuremberg
NSDAP summit in 1935 and of the Berlin Olympics 1936. Both were
propaganda events. The visual power of theses movies is nothing less
than spectacular, and all that with limited technical means of the mid
1930s! Imagine what she could have done in Hollywood! Particularly the
documentary of the 1936 party summit gives the impression that
Riefenstahl did not simply "cover" the event, but that she was the
choreographer. She was not a plain Nazi collaborator, naive and
ignorant. She made the Nazis to dance for her. Maybe she wasn't a
dedicated Nazi, but she didn't bother to do propaganda for them. And
because of her work the allies wanted the trials to take place in
Nuremberg, too. 

In the early 1930s she was a highly talented, young film director. A
women. And many of her more established competitors had to leave
Germany. How we would have decided in her place at the time? She
preferrred to ignore the horror part and focussed on pure
professionalism. Do your job as good as possible irrespective for whom
and what. Secondary virtues we call that. This makes her story still
interesting today. 

Regarding the Nuba thing, I think it is decent craftmanship, but not at
all at the level of her pre-war work. I didn't know about the Magnum
photographer who covered the Nuba before her. So her contribution is not
original. The motivation to do it most likely was psychological. She
wanted to take photos of "innocent" people this time. And she wanted to
demonstrate that in the first place she is a good photographer. Later
she was accused that her visits contributed to the deterioration of the
Nuba culture. They began to wear baseball caps, addidas shorts and
bikini tops.

Of course she used contemporary Leica equipment from the early 1970s:
two M5 and two Leiceflex SL mot with the complete line of lenses from
21mm to 560mm. How that 70+ year old women managed to carry all that?

HP
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