Ruttmann's film, which would have covered the rise of the Nazi Party from 1923 to 1934 and been more overtly propagandistic (the opening text of Triumph of the Will was his), did not appeal to Hitler.
According to Kenneth Poferl, "Flying in an airplane was a luxury known only to a select few in the 1930s, but Hitler had made himself widely associated with the practice, having been the first politician to campaign via air travel.
The entire crowd sings the Horst-Wessel-Lied as the camera focuses on the giant Swastika banner, which fades into a line of silhouetted men in Nazi party uniforms, marching in formation as the lyrics "Comrades shot by the Red Front and the Reactionaries march in spirit together in our columns" are sung. ==Origins== Riefenstahl, a popular German actress, had directed her first film called Das blaue Licht (The Blue Light) in 1932.
In Germany, the film is not censored but the courts commonly classify it as Nazi propaganda, which requires an educational context to public screenings. An earlier film by Riefenstahl—The Victory of Faith (Der Sieg des Glaubens)—showed Hitler and SA leader Ernst Röhm together at the 1933 Nazi Party Congress.
Hitler, by turn, was equally impressed with Das blaue Licht, and in 1933 asked her to direct a film about the Nazis' annual Nuremberg Rally.
Hitler persisted and Riefenstahl eventually agreed to make a film at the 1933 Nuremberg Rally called Der Sieg des Glaubens (Victory of Faith).
Further, this was not the first political film made by Riefenstahl for the Third Reich (there was Victory of Faith, 1933), nor was it the last (Day of Freedom, 1935, and Olympia, 1938).
It chronicles the 1934 Nazi Party Congress in Nuremberg, which was attended by more than 700,000 Nazi supporters.
Because the film was made after the 1934 Night of the Long Knives (on 30 June), many prominent Sturmabteilung (SA) members are absent—they were murdered in that Party purge, organized and orchestrated by Hitler to replace the SA with the Schutzstaffel (SS) as his main paramilitary force. Triumph of the Will was released in 1935 and became a major example of film used as propaganda.
It was considered a lost film until a copy turned up in the 1980s in the German Democratic Republic's film archives. In 1934, Riefenstahl had no wish to repeat the fiasco of Der Sieg des Glaubens and initially recommended fellow director Walter Ruttmann.
Ruttmann's film, which would have covered the rise of the Nazi Party from 1923 to 1934 and been more overtly propagandistic (the opening text of Triumph of the Will was his), did not appeal to Hitler.
Riefenstahl shot Triumph of the Will on a budget of roughly 280,000RM (approximately US$110,000 in 1934, $1.54 m in 2015).
In 1934, over a million Germans participated in the Nuremberg Rally. ==Response== Triumph of the Will premiered on 28 March 1935 at the Berlin Ufa Palace Theater and was an instant success.
Berlin Diary: The Journal of a Foreign Correspondent 1934–1941.
Includes a contemporary account of the 1934 Nuremberg rally. (Complete screenplay.) ==External links== Das Blaue Licht: Triumph des Willens (1935), the original Riefenstahl website Screenplay of Triumph of the Will, DasBlaueLicht.net Hinter den Kulissen des Reichsparteitag-Films, Riefenstahl's 1935 book on the making of the film with many photographs Lambeth Walk – Nazi Style, by Charles A.
Triumph of the Will (Triumph des Willens) is a 1935 Nazi propaganda film directed, produced, edited and co-written by Leni Riefenstahl.
Because the film was made after the 1934 Night of the Long Knives (on 30 June), many prominent Sturmabteilung (SA) members are absent—they were murdered in that Party purge, organized and orchestrated by Hitler to replace the SA with the Schutzstaffel (SS) as his main paramilitary force. Triumph of the Will was released in 1935 and became a major example of film used as propaganda.
In 1934, over a million Germans participated in the Nuremberg Rally. ==Response== Triumph of the Will premiered on 28 March 1935 at the Berlin Ufa Palace Theater and was an instant success.
Hitler praised the film as being an "incomparable glorification of the power and beauty of our Movement." For her efforts, Riefenstahl was rewarded with the German Film Prize (Deutscher Filmpreis), a gold medal at the 1935 Venice Biennale, and the Grand Prix at the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris.
Further, this was not the first political film made by Riefenstahl for the Third Reich (there was Victory of Faith, 1933), nor was it the last (Day of Freedom, 1935, and Olympia, 1938).
She did agree to return to the 1935 rally to make a film exclusively about the Wehrmacht, which became Unsere Wehrmacht (Day of Freedom: Our Armed Forces). ==Influences and legacy== Triumph of the Will remains well known for its striking visuals.
Includes a contemporary account of the 1934 Nuremberg rally. (Complete screenplay.) ==External links== Das Blaue Licht: Triumph des Willens (1935), the original Riefenstahl website Screenplay of Triumph of the Will, DasBlaueLicht.net Hinter den Kulissen des Reichsparteitag-Films, Riefenstahl's 1935 book on the making of the film with many photographs Lambeth Walk – Nazi Style, by Charles A.
And we find ourselves—to be sure, rather uncomfortably—seeing 'Hitler' and not Hitler, the '1936 Olympics' and not the 1936 Olympics.
Hitler praised the film as being an "incomparable glorification of the power and beauty of our Movement." For her efforts, Riefenstahl was rewarded with the German Film Prize (Deutscher Filmpreis), a gold medal at the 1935 Venice Biennale, and the Grand Prix at the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris.
Further, this was not the first political film made by Riefenstahl for the Third Reich (there was Victory of Faith, 1933), nor was it the last (Day of Freedom, 1935, and Olympia, 1938).
Riefenstahl unsuccessfully sued the Swedish production company Minerva-Film for copyright violation, although she did receive forty thousand marks in compensation from German and Austrian distributors of the film. In 1942, Charles A.
As one historian notes, "many of the most enduring images of the [Nazi] regime and its leader derive from Riefenstahl's film." Extensive excerpts of the film were used in Erwin Leiser's documentary Mein Kampf, produced in Sweden in 1960.
In 1964, she returned to this topic, saying: However, Riefenstahl was an active participant in the rally, though in later years she downplayed her influence significantly, claiming, "I just observed and tried to film it well.
In Triumph of Will, the document (the image) is no longer simply the record of reality; 'reality' has been constructed to serve the image." This is considerably different from the position she takes ten years earlier in a 1965 essay entitled "On Style," where she opposes the idea that Riefenstahl's propaganda films are purely propaganda, and writes: "To call Leni Riefenstahl's The Triumph of the Will and The Olympiad masterpieces is not to gloss over Nazi propaganda with aesthetic lenience.
According to the March 17, 1965 law regarding the regulation of liabilities of national socialist institutions and the legal relationships concerning their assets, all rights and assets of the NSDAP were transferred to the Federal Republic of Germany, and anything relating to film business was to be managed by Transit Film GmbH. Since the death of Leni Riefenstahl the federally owned Transit Film GmbH holds the exclusive right of use to all rights of the film.
Through Riefenstahl's genius as a film-maker, the 'content' has—let us even assume, against her intentions—come to play a purely formal role." Brian Winston's essay on the film in The Movies in History (2000) is largely a critique of Sontag's 1975 analysis.
In the 1980s, one was discovered in the German Democratic Republic's film archives. Frank Capra's seven-film series Why We Fight was directly inspired by Triumph of the Will and the United States' response to it. ==Synopsis== The film begins with a prologue, the only commentary in the film.
It was considered a lost film until a copy turned up in the 1980s in the German Democratic Republic's film archives. In 1934, Riefenstahl had no wish to repeat the fiasco of Der Sieg des Glaubens and initially recommended fellow director Walter Ruttmann.
The Independent wrote in 2003: "Triumph of the Will seduced many wise men and women, persuaded them to admire rather than to despise, and undoubtedly won the Nazis friends and allies all over the world." The reception in other countries was not always as enthusiastic.
When she died in 2003—sixty-eight years after the film's premiere—her obituary received significant coverage in many major publications, including the Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Guardian, most of which reaffirmed the importance of Triumph of the Will. ==Controversy== Like American filmmaker D.
Riefenstahl shot Triumph of the Will on a budget of roughly 280,000RM (approximately US$110,000 in 1934, $1.54 m in 2015).
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