Leni Riefenstahl and the power of images

JAN 19 2025

A public broadcaster's documentary on Riefenstahl's technique and its effect, focusing on the Nuremberg rally film and the 1936 Olympics films. The devices are identifiable and were widely copied afterwards: low camera angles that enlarge a single figure, the massed geometry of crowds, and editing cut to music rather than to speech. It also addresses her lifelong denial of complicity.