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August 2002, Week 4

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Subject:
From:
"Larsson, Donald F." <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Tue, 27 Aug 2002 13:54:18 -0500
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Two more reasons:

1. She has been quite talented as a filmmaker and photographer, subject
matter aside.

2. Because of that talent, her career impinges on a number of issues
that are less complex in the cases of more mediocre (if more vicious and
politically influential) filmmakers:
Aestheticism vs.(?) political commitment
Whether there is a "facsist aesthetic"
Artistic intentionality
Documentary "truth"
Abstracting an ideal image of the human (male?) body
u.s.w.

One might compare the range of reactions of reviewers to the recent show
of early works by that other, far less talented but much more
influential, artist--Adolf Hitler!

Don Larsson
-----------------------------------------------------------
"Only connect" --E.M. Forster
Donald F. Larsson
Department of English, AH 230
Minnesota State U, Mankato (56001
[log in to unmask]


-----Original Message-----
From: Leo Enticknap [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, August 26, 2002 2:38 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Reply: leni riefenstahl turns 100 today

Why does Riefenstahl continue to receive so much critical and
historiographical attention when there are many other Nazi directors who
did a lot more damage? I think most people would conclude that
Riefenstahl
was quite a nasty Nazi, but there were some far nastier ones:
anniversaries
relating to (for example) Veit Harlan, Fritz Hippler, Wolfgang
Leibeneiner
and Karl Ritter do not attract any comment, though the films these
people
were responsible for did far more damage than any of Riefenstahl's.

Some possible reasons:

1. She's still alive.
2. She's a woman.
3. She had close relationships with a number of senior Nazis, and is
alleged to have had an affair with Hitler (as Robert Harris commented in
his book on the Hitler diaries fiasco, 'swastikas sell').
4. 'Triumph des Willens' and 'Olympische Spiele' were shown in Western
Europe and the US at the time of their initial release, but many of the
most notorious Nazi fiction films weren't 'discovered' until after the
war.
5. She continues to take an active interest in the exploitation of her
films from the Nazi period, and aggressively pursues legal action
against
her detractors whenever she can.

Responses?

Leo.

Dr. Leo Enticknap
Director, Northern Region Film and Television Archive
School of Arts and Media
University of Teesside
Middlesbrough TS1 3BA
United Kingdom
Tel. +44-(0)1642 384022
Fax. +44-(0)1642 384099
Brainfryer: +44-(0)7710 417383

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