Showing results by publisher "Phoenix Books" in Germany

Leni Riefenstahl, "Hitler's filmmaker", remains one of the most controversial figures of the 20th century. Susan Sontag, though one of her severest critics, said that Triumph of the Will and Olympia, Riefenstahl's most noted films, "may be the two greatest documentaries ever made". Others see her story as an object lesson about opportunism.

Known as “Hitler's Filmmaker,” Leni Riefenstahl directed two of the most innovative and effective propaganda documentaries ever made, Triumph of the Will (1935) and Olympia (1938), which glorified the Third Reich. In this definitive biography, Steven Bach illuminates the truths and lies regarding the self-proclaimed apolitical artist's involvement with Hitler and other Nazi leaders who financed and advanced her career. Probing the borders that divide art and beauty from truth and humanity, Bach untangles the past and gives an objective but unsparing appraisal.