Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph Of The Will

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Bill Nichols argues in his book Introduction to Documentary about the power of nonfiction films to give visual and audible representation to topics for which written and spoken language only gives concepts. Nonfiction films allow the audience to put a face to the concept discussed in the film. This allows a filmmaker to not only explain a concept through the film, but have the concept generate a certain emotional response from the audience. In Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will (1935), National Socialism is embodied as a unifying idea that has all of Germany in one collective. Riefenstahl uses many long shots of crowds gathering to see Hitler speak. A great example is during Hitler’s speech at the Totenehrung, where the camera stands high …show more content…

Many images portray the city as a beautiful seaside resort for the upper class, but these images are often juxtaposed with images featuring the impoverished working class. This is shown through the various elements that make up the city. One particular example is the section on sports, where scenes of upper class sports such as sailing, and formula one are interplaced with scenes of sports the lower class enjoys such as bocce ball. Typically the shots of the lower shots of the lower class, especially in the early scenes on the dock, are shots of them performing labor. This helps the viewer recognize the labor that is needed to make this city’s resort status possible. Sometimes the film will have a subject of the lower class out of place among the upper class. A good example of this is the scene with the begging woman and her baby. The woman is dressed in rags that seem unfit among the many nicely dressed people populating the pier. The film also features a clear distinction between the lower class slums of the city, and the nice seaside resorts. Halfway through the film the camera moves away from the bright, open spaces of the seaside to a notably dark, and cramped area that is the slums. The much stronger use of shadows and darker spaces makes the viewer feel as though they’ve entered