Triumph of the Will - Documentary

[sqccccccccc]

Good doc!

[GZVidz]

The reality is, if you are a unknown filmmaker looking for work, you will do anything to get a job. And when you get that job, you do the best you can because you want more high paying work doing what you love. She made an unbelieveable documentary that was visionary for its time. Did Hitler consult her about whether he should invade Poland four years later? I doubt it.

[R3dp055um]

Leni Riefenstahl was a cinematic genius. Judging an artist for the politics of the subjects of her art is beyond ridiculous.

That french man being interviewed says, "without the film the rally would not have existed". WTF kind of existentialist garbage is that? Reality is reality, whether or not it is documented.

No, I think what we have here is just a Frenchman who hates Germans.

[flyingmagiccarpet]

@ R3dp055um:

What utter bullshit! Anyone who is not braindead can see how Riefenstahl was MASSIVELY pushing the Nazi agenda with her movies! A documentary keeps a distance - Riefenstahl is 100% committed, IDENTICAL with the Nazis and what they stand for. She depicts those on the rallies as Gods, as superhuman heros. Talking heros: Do you know what effect it creates to film someone from ground looking up? This to this day is called "hero-shot" in Hollywood. A glorification. Not a documentation.

[R3dp055um]

@flyingmagiccarpet

I fart in your general direction.

Go peddle your hatred somewhere else.

[flyingmagiccarpet]

@ R3dp055um:

The question is: Is this propaganda or not. It clearly is. Please tell me how on earth it is "anti-german" to state that? Riefenstahl is not a representative for Germany as far as that is concerned, she is a representative for her own mindset that is pityful. To her death, age 101, she did not acknowledge she contributed to the rise of fascism! Pitiful, really!

[R3dp055um]

@flyingmagiccarpet

I repeat, you're just a hater looking for an excuse to hate on someone. Acknowledge that your problems lie within you, and stop trying to take it out on others.

[flyingmagiccarpet]

@ R3dp055um:

I might not be a perfect person. However this does not mean anything of what I said would be less true so this is off topic - seems you´re trying to distract here.

Riefenstahl -> Propaganda, yes or no?!? You already tried to disregard what this dude said in the clip by calling him a "hater". Looks like we got a pattern here! ;D

[R3dp055um]

@flyingmagiccarpet

Hello! I thought I already answered that question in my original post, to which the hater was taking such angry offense. But to revisit, no.

Josef Goebbels made propaganda, Lord Haw-haw made propaganda, Tokyo Rose made propaganda. Leni Riefenstahl made films.

[flyingmagiccarpet]

@ R3dp055um:

Then you are either lying about it while knowing it better, or you have no idea of cinematography! Anyone who does, will IMMEDIATELY tell you it is propaganda, so blatantly obvious is it! Even the most "German-loving" people would agree on that. By the way you do not do Germany a favor by defending those who bring Germany down. Be they skilled as they will!

[moparmonster1965]

@flyingmagiccarpet I saw a documentary that said something slong the lines of that when Germany was liberated by the Americans, British, and Russians, all of sudden, no one had supported Hitler and no one was a party member, so ashamed and horrified were they at the ultimate outcome of the regime.

It's no more anti-German to call this propaganda than it is pro-Italian to eat artichokes.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

That "noone had been a member of the nazi party" is correct. Only they claimed this not necessarily out of being ashamed - that would require they actually REALIZED what they had been supporting. Though this may have been the case for a tiny minority, the majority of those who denied their own actions of the past did this only out of good old opportunism. It was opportune to be a nazi before April ´45, it was opportune to be a "anti"-nazi thereafter. Only few were sincere.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum Agreed 100%, and we saw that most strongly in Austria, annexed under the anschluss policy. And this was also the reason that the Allied forced marched German citizens through the concentration camps so they could see what their leaders had been doing. I don't fault the average garden-variety German citizen because Nazism was a way of life for them; it was the leaders who gave the orders and those who enthusiastically carried them out.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

Yes. A leader carries a special responsibility, as it is HIS choice WHERE to lead. Nevertheless also his FOLLOWERS carry responsibility! Why did they not just say "no"? At the early stages, this would have been very well possible. Instead, millions got high on the cheap emotion of feeling superior, better, "chosen". Those who call Riefenstahls psycho-active, emotion-oozing pieces of propaganda "documentaries" seem to be unable to tell FOOD from DRUG anymore. ^^

[moparmonster1965]

Hitler also promised to restore the honor that the Treaty of Versailles stole from the German people, to avenge the wrong that it imposed on them.

What would you do? Watch your children starve to death or join in the movement that was actually getting results and putting people to work?

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

The Treaty of Versailles was idiotic and vile. Of course I can perfectly see how this played into the hands of the hate preachers at the nazi party. The way I see it, those who made the Treaty of Versailles carry a very similar responsibility for their actions as the mass murders of the nazis did.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum I'd stop well short of calling the French and British authors of the Treaty responsible for the concentration camps and subsequent Final Solution. They opened the door, but Hitler lead Germany through it.

The entire point of the Treaty was revenge; to break Germany's back and to ensure that they'd never be able to mount another attack on them. This mindset was physically manifested in the Maginot Line which was supposed to keep Germany form French soil forever.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

Yup. The concentration camps were built by others. Those who made the treaty, however, are responsible for having provided the best imaginable foundation upon which hate preachers like the nazis could build their success. All the DECENT Germans that also existed, then were not listened to any more. Nice going... ;-) And once more proof that not revenge is the answer, but rehabilitation...

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum Agreed here, but once again, without the dark purposes that we now see in hindsight, Hitler's movement was seen as the savior of a Germany beaten and humiliated. With so much unemployment, any relief was welcome and the Nazis exploited that for their own purposes which were remaking the country in their own image and the rearmament of Germany.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum I lay the responsibility for the murder factories squarely at the feet of Adolph Hitler and those who fervently followed him.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

I do not confine the blame to those two. Those, who "just stood there and watched" are VERY much responsible, as well.

For instance, anti-semitism was a very widespread phenomenon in Europe in those times. The respect for lawfulness was minimal, as I already pointed out. So Hitler, and all the brutal and reckless psychopaths who beat up people in the streets, committed murder, abducted innocent civilians etc. KNEW they could count on the public NOT TO INTERVENE!

[moparmonster1965]

Regarding your assertion about the concentration camps, I find no evidence that they were established by any other than the Nazi Germans. They weren't the first to build such camps since the concept goes back to the Russian camps during the Bar Confederation conflict. (1767-1772)

The public wouldn't intervene because they largely approved of the initial actions against the Jews, but once things spiralled out of control, they dared not say anything at all.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

I just said that the authors of the Treaty of Versailles were responsible for many bad consequences, but the concentration camps were built by the nazis. The British also had "concentration camps", as had the Americans. But they were nowhere as cruel as those of the nazis - and extermination camps such as Auschwitz existed NOWHERE else. And I agree: After a certain time had passed, resisting the nazis was pretty much a suicide mission.

[moparmonster1965]

The intended meaning was lost and taken to support for the notion that Germany had actually been on track to win the war, but was undermined by Jewish forces, the Weimar Republic, or the Communists, take your pick.

Hitler referred to this betrayal over and over again with the phrase "November criminals," in both his speeches and in Mein Krapf.

[moparmonster1965]

On the matter of anti-Semitism, something I forgot to mention is that the German populace commonly believed that the German army was betrayed-stabbed in the back-by, you guessed it, the Jews. Even Reichsprasident Friedrich Ebert told the returning troops that "no enemy has vanquished you."

[moparmonster1965]

comfortable with the stripping of rights from them under the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, so long as they weren't Great War veterans, civil servants during the war, or those civil servants whose fathers were veterans. Otherwise, this 'law' dismissed all Jewish civil servants who didn't meet the previous criteria. After Hindenburg's death, however, the chain of dominoes fell rapidly.

[moparmonster1965]

This was largely an excuse for the Gentile's poor treatment of the Jews, but an effective one.

The dehumanization of the Jews in Germany started slowly in the 1930s because even Hindenburg was

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum I suppose that's fair, but anti-Semitism wasn't confined to Germany whatsoever. Parts of England had expelled them altogether, as well as any largely Roman Catholic area. Why? The RCC has long blamed the Jews for the crucifixion and death of Jesus Christ. I grew up Catholic and heard it for much of my childhood, though the tone wasn't as loud as it once had been.

[moparmonster1965]

You also need to remember that the government was publishing 500,000 Mark notes because inflation was so high and there were no jobs. It took over 100,000 Marks just to buy a loaf of bread so anyone who offered a solution, one that actually worked like Hitler's, was going to be seen as a savior of the country.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum I agree with you up to the point that people hadn't the ability to say no to anything because they woke up one morning to find themselves in a police state. Not only that, but many supported the Nazis anyway, so they wouldn't have at the time anyway.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

No. This is not how it happened. Before the reign of the fascists, we had the Weimar Repuplic. If you study the politics of this time, you will see there was ABSOLUTELY AMAZING politicians then, wise men who only had the good for everyone in mind. Then came the nazis. And the dull, stupid masses preferred the easy-to-look-through "solutions" of the nazis over the wisdom of said few. There was NO SUPPORT for lawfulness and human rights then. Thats why the nazis could succeed!

[moparmonster1965]

Hindenburg was also in increasingly poor mental health so it's hard to say how much he was aware of, but he agreed to the Reichstag Fire Decree, which suspended all civil liberties in the country and, when combined with the Enabling Act of 1933, it basically gave Hitler all of the country's political power. When Hindenburg died, Hitler was the uncontested and unelected leader of Germany.

Check my facts and you'll find that I'm right here.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

Hindenburg always preferred the conservatives. As someone from Prussia (=special mindset), he probably also liked Hitlers authoritarian, "disciplined" style. Otto von Bismarck quite heavily contributed to the rise of the totalitarian state, as well, enabling a person like Hitler to achieve total power. The public didn't care, most applauded. Just look at the results of the election in the years before 1933: Hitler´s NSDAP practically SKYROCKETED!

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum Everything I can find states that the two detested each other; it was an unhappy marriage of necessity, or rather, perceived necessity.

Bismarck couldn't have had much of an impact on Hitler's ascension to power since he died in 1898, although he made this prediction: "One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans." Gavrilo Princip was a Bosnian Serb and killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife in Sarajevo.

Accurate?

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

If I am informed correctly, Bismarck during his lifetime idiotically made the office of the Reichskanzler one that comes with unlimited power. So when decades later Hitler was given that office, he could easily take apart any lawfulness that still existed in Germany. Wise men know that they need to subordinate themselves under the law, when they want to impose law on others. But idiots do not stop at that - they always want ALL the power to themselves!

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum That's not exactly true; as Chancellor, the only person who could remove him from power was Hindenburg, so Hitler was always positive and even fawned over the aging leader, waiting for the day he died so he could merge the offices of Chancellor and President. That's what I meant in a previous post when I said that the German people woke up one day in a police state because once Hindenburg died, Hitler was the all-powerful and uncontested Fuhrer.

[moparmonster1965]

Meanwhile, Hitler found his 'voice' with the NSDAP, which he reformed for his own purposes. Hinderburg, trying to stem social and political instability, and after much political intrigue and manuevering, tried to keep the peace by appointing Hitler Chancellor. He didn't want to because the two didn't like each other, but Hitler lead the second largest party in the country.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum The Weimar Republic was weak and ineffective, largely crippled by a terrible economy caused, in part, by the Treaty of Versailles; its problems included hyperinflation, political extremists on the left and the right and their paramilitaries, and hostility from the victors of World War I, who tried twice to restructure Germany's reparations payments through the Dawes Plan and the Young Plan.

[tallulabella]

@flyingmagiccarpet I completely agree. Riefenstahl NEVER took any responsibility for the shameless propaganda she produced. She justified her actions by claiming that it was about "art", not politics. Pure cowardice! ALL her so-called "documentaries" do nothing more than glorify the "Third Reich" and propagate Nazi insanity. Compare her BS to the work of the REAL artists were forced into exile by the Nazis - it's shameful!

[taxiuniversum]

@ tallulabella:

Exactly. She was delusional when she created the hysteria in favor of the nazis, and she was delusional just the same when she glossed over her actions after the war was over. It is sad for her skills, that they were wasted to this regime. But while it lasted, she had a terrific time - while other artists suffered in the camps and got gassed.

[moparmonster1965]

@R3dp055um I agree; the film was, indeed, a documentary that was used for propaganda. The rally would've occurred anyway, and the party simply took advantage of it. Does that mean that parts weren't staged or cut in such a way to show Nazism in the best possible light? Of course not, but the country didn't stage the rally for the express point of making a propaganda film either.

[Thornfox]

I think I sympathize with Claude here; some aspects of the rally were arranged to make it easier for Riefenstahl to shoot. That being said, it doesn't necessarily mean she was a Nazi supporter.

[taxiuniversum]

@ Thornfox:

This does not matter. Riefenstahl was of exactly the same mindset people like Hitler or Goebbels were: Glorifying the supposedly "genetically superior" Germans, cultivating ignorance towards the supposedly "inferior" non-Germans. Btw. when I say "German" here, I mean German as defined by the nazis - because the Gypsies, Socialists, Christians, Jews and so forth, who came from this land and were brutally murdered were Germans just the same.

Riefenstahl made evil propaganda. Period.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum You bring up an interesting point that I hadn't considered before; while the Germans were considered, by the Nazi regime, to be genetically superior to all others, the film can be seen as implying it without actually saying so.

Was Riefenstahl an ardent Nazi? I don't think there's any evidence of that either way, but yes, she probably was and then significantly downplayed her involvement after the war.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

Was Riefenstahl a ardent nazi? Good question. From what we know about her, she would not appear to be the classical "ardent nazi". But she functioned perfectly within the system. As so many others, scientists for instance, soldiers, police officers - she did EXACTLY what was expected of her. So many of such people AFTER the war hid behind the "orders" they were given. Yet it was EXACTLY these masses of individual yes-persons that gave this totalitarian regime it´s vigor.

[moparmonster1965]

Part of my family is Polish and if the Nazis had been successful in eradicating Europe's Jews, it's pretty obvious that the Polish-and then all Slavs- were next on the chopping block. Poland stood between Germany and the Ukraine, one of Hitler's stated goals for the expansion of the Reich, but she also held the important port of Danzig. Poland was also unfortunate enough to divide Germany and Prussia.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum I agree with you on all points except that people like that aren't exactly the vigor of a dictatorial government, but rather enablers, like Carmela Soprano to her husband, making sure he has clean clothes and a hot meal.

Yes, all were simply 'following orders' when put on trial in Nuremberg, a disgusting cop-out for the monstrosities they inflicted on humanity. No one was an active participant-they were all unwilling puppets with no free will.

[taxiuniversum]

@ moparmonster1965:

What Riefenstahl did for Hitler and his gang of psychopaths went well beyond just providing for some meal and clean clothes - she orchestrated extremely powerful images that made gullible people believe in the nazis like others would believe in God. They say that in advertisement, emotions and "gut"-feeling are WAY more important than facts. Thus, she was a AWESOME advertiser for an evil regime - and helped to discredit anyone who rightfully warned of the nazis.

[moparmonster1965]

At our core, I think we all want to believe in something, to be part of a cause greater than ourselves, and to be one of the chosen. Hitler gave them exactly that and no one really considered that there was a dark underbelly until it was too late to change course.

[moparmonster1965]

@taxiuniversum I have to agree; I really couldn't say it any better. Whether she was a true believer or not, her contribution is undeniable.

There's a real suspension of disbelief when it comes to Nazisim and Germany's blind faith in it. People wanted to believe in something so badly because of the country's recent shitty economy and social turmoil that it gave them a cause to focus on, which opens the door for the atrocities to follow.

[moparmonster1965]

I have a set of books "The Nazi Doctors" that detail some of the experiments and 'proven' ways that the Germans were superior to others using psuedo scientific methods. A fascinating and still frightening read of how the concentration camps and death factories worked and operated on a day-to-day basis.

[Wieland1985]

willst du darauf wirklich eine Antwort?

[carinhall1]

Wieland : -Ja

[carinhall1]

Leni Riefenstahl hat mit Triumph des Willens ihren besten Dokumentarfilm gedreht. Warum wird der in der BRD zensiert ? -Angst vor der Wirklichkeit ?