A triumph of propaganda

 

Last updated 9/20/2005 at Noon



Triumph of the Will is the most powerful piece of propaganda every produced.

Leni Riefenstahl’s magnificent 1935 record of the 1934 Nazi Convention in Nuremberg documents how Adolf Hitler used his personal charisma to exploit Germans’ economic and psychological plight after World War I.

The film opens with Hitler’s plane flying above the clouds. We watch his god-like descent as the plane soars above the city, its shadow enveloping everything below until it lands in the midst of a waving crowd.

To the accompaniment of triumphant music, Riefenstahl convinces viewers that Hitler’s progress through the streets is as historic as the city’s building and statues.

The next morning the camera pans around the quiet city with Nazi flags everywhere. Church bells ring, emphasizing the Nazi Party’s Christian connection. The soldiers work and play in a great display of camaraderie and equality. Differently costumed, but unified, peasants parade by with lots of beautiful produce and children.

The Sixth Party Congress takes place in a huge hall filled with people and flags. Speakers say that Hitler is Germany, the guarantor of victory and peace. They pledge to stand by him in good times and bad. They ask the foreign press to report the truth about Germany. One says that a nation that does not protect its racial purity will perish.

Hitler inspects 52,000 Reich Labor Service men. Holding spades on their shoulders, they symbolize the resurrection of Germany’s labor force, 40 percent of whom were unemployed previously. Hitler assures them that all types of labor, including manual, will be regarded as equally valuable under one Reich, one Fuhrer.

The next day Hitler reviews thousands of youths. Their leader says they know no class distinctions, are selfless and represent the ideal of faith and the faithful. Hitler promises a future with no castes or classes, only one people, one Reich.

Hitler reviews an endless, extraordinarily organized mass of troops as they parade by, including a “sea of flags.” As night falls again, Riefenstahl makes these flags look like they go on forever.

Hitler tells the 200,000 assembled men that they are brought together by their hearts and loyalty. “It was the great calamities of our people that moved us” and caused the German people’s struggle. Other nations don’t understand Germans’ misery and deprivation. They don’t understand that the State doesn’t order us; we order the State. So long as one of us breathes, he will give life to the movement and fight for it. . . . Ours is a great mission created by God who created our people.”

The next day the sun comes up over the traditional German emblem combined with a swastika, visually tying together Germany’s proud past with the Nazi Party. Hitler walks through huge columns of soldiers shot from above as if they encompass the whole earth.

Hitler’s motorcade passes by people hanging from building windows and filling every possible space on the ground. They cheer and salute; bands play; troops parade. The camera outlines Hitler against the sky, an all-powerful figure.

Hitler again addresses an enormous hall jammed with people. He tells them that the Nazi Party has two principles: a true ideology and to be the one and only power in Germany. Its members, the racially best of the German Empire, demand to be the leaders of the Reich. “Whoever feels he carries the best blood will lead the Nation.” He tells them that it is not enough to say, “I believe.”

Members must say, “I will fight.”

“The Party’s total image will be that of a Holy Order. Only the best National Socialists will be party members. We will expunge what is bad. What is bad has no place among us. The future is ours entirely. The youth will carry on the struggle.”

Another speaker says: “The Party is Hitler. Hitler is Germany. Germany is Hitler.”

At the film’s end the people sing while saluting. A gigantic swastika fills the screen and then fades to marching troops, an ominous indication of Germany’s growing military power.

After the war Riefenstahl, an actress and athlete, spent four years in jail for being a Nazi “sympathizer.” Regarded as one of the world’s greatest filmmakers for both Triumph and her equally masterful Olympia (1938), many people never forgave her collaboration with the Nazis and her career was ruined. She died in 2003 at age 101.

(Editor’s note: Triumph of the Will is available through the Deschutes Public Library System).

 

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