Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl was a German film director, producer, writer, editor, photographer and actress. She is considered one of the most controversial personalities in film history. On the one hand, she is regarded by many critics as an "innovative filmmaker and creative aesthete", while on the other hand she is criticized for her works in the service of propaganda during the Nazi era.
Luis Trenker was a South Tyrolean film producer, director, writer, actor, architect, alpinist, and bobsledder.
Arnold Fanck was a German film director and pioneer of the mountain film genre. He is best known for the extraordinary alpine footage he captured in such films as The Holy Mountain (1926), The White Hell of Pitz Palu (1929), Storm over Mont Blanc (1930), The White Ecstasy (1931), and S.O.S. Eisberg (1933). Fanck was also instrumental in launching the careers of several filmmakers during the Weimar years in Germany, including Leni Riefenstahl, Luis Trenker, and cinematographers Sepp Allgeier, Richard Angst, Hans Schneeberger, and Walter Riml.
A mountain film is a film genre that focuses on mountaineering and especially the battle of human against nature. In addition to mere adventure, the protagonists who return from the mountain come back changed, usually gaining wisdom and enlightenment.
S.O.S. Eisberg is a 1933 German-US pre-Code drama film directed by Arnold Fanck and starring Gustav Diessl, Leni Riefenstahl, Sepp Rist, Gibson Gowland, Rod La Rocque, and Ernst Udet. The film was written by Tom Reed based on a story by Arnold Fanck and Friedrich Wolf. S.O.S. Eisberg follows the account of the real-life Alfred Lothar Wegener polar expedition of 1929-30.
The White Ecstasy is a 1931 German mountain film written and directed by Arnold Fanck and starring Hannes Schneider, Leni Riefenstahl, Guzzi Lantschner, and Walter Riml. The film is about the skiing exploits of a young village girl, and her attempts to master the sport of skiing and ski-jumping aided by the local ski expert. Filmed on location in Sankt Anton am Arlberg, the film was one of the first to use and develop outdoor film-making techniques and featured several innovative action-skiing scenes.
The White Hell of Pitz Palu is a 1929 German silent mountain film co-directed by Arnold Fanck and G. W. Pabst and starring Leni Riefenstahl, Gustav Diessl, Ernst Petersen, and World War I pilot Ernst Udet. Written by Fanck and Ladislaus Vajda, the film is about a man who loses his wife in an avalanche while climbing the Piz Palü mountain, and spends the next few years searching the mountain alone for her body. Four years later he meets a young couple who agree to accompany him on his next climb. The White Hell of Pitz Palu was filmed on location in the Bernina Range in Graubünden, Switzerland.
Tiefland ("Lowlands") is a 1954 West German opera drama film directed, produced, co-written, edited by and starring Leni Riefenstahl, and based on the 1903 eponymous opera composed by Eugen d'Albert to a libretto by Rudolph Lothar based on the 1896 Catalan play Terra baixa by Àngel Guimerà. The film co-stars Bernhard Minetti, and is Riefenstahl's last feature film as both director and lead actress.
Giuseppe Becce was an Italian-born film score composer who enriched the German cinema.
Hans Ertl was a German mountaineer and Nazi propagandist. He is most known for being the father of Monika Ertl, the Communist guerrilla who assassinated Roberto Quintanilla Pereira, the man responsible for chopping off Che Guevara's hands.
Walter Riml was an Austrian cameraman and actor.
The Blue Light is a black-and-white 1932 film directed by Leni Riefenstahl and written by Béla Balázs with uncredited scripting by Carl Mayer. In Riefenstahl's film version, the witch, Junta, played by Riefenstahl, is intended to be a sympathetic character. Filming took place in the Brenta Dolomites, in Ticino, Switzerland, and Sarntal, South Tirol.
Peter the Pirate, also known in English as The Sea Wolves, is a 1925 German silent historical adventure film directed by Arthur Robison and starring Paul Richter, Aud Egede-Nissen, and Rudolf Klein-Rogge. It was based on the 1925 novel by Wilhelm Hegeler. Leni Riefenstahl was offered the role of female lead by producer Erich Pommer, but after doing a screen test she turned it down.
Mountain of Destiny is a 1924 German silent drama film written and directed by Arnold Fanck and starring Hannes Schneider, Frida Richard, Erna Morena, and Luis Trenker. The film is about an alpinist who falls to his death while climbing a dangerous peak. His son later succeeds where his father had failed. The film was released in the United Kingdom with the title The Mountaineers. After seeing Mountain of Destiny, Leni Riefenstahl, then a dancer, decided she wanted to start appearing in films. She got in touch with Fanck and starred in his 1926 film The Holy Mountain.
The Great Leap is a 1927 German silent comedy film directed by Arnold Fanck and starring Leni Riefenstahl, Luis Trenker and Hans Schneeberger. A young Italian girl living in the Dolomites falls in love with a member of a tourist party skiing on the nearby mountains.
Hans Schneeberger was an Austrian cinematographer who worked on over eighty films during his career. During the 1920s and early 1930s Schneeberger worked frequently with the director Arnold Fanck, including films starring Leni Riefenstahl. Schneeberger also made a handful of acting appearances, including playing opposite Riefenstahl in The Great Leap (1927). He filmed the famous final shot in The Third Man but was not credited. Schneeberger was later employed by the largest Austrian company Wien-Film for a number of productions.
Josef “Sepp” Allgeier was a German cinematographer who worked on around fifty features, documentaries and short films. He began his career as a cameraman in 1911 for the Expreß Film Co. of Freiburg im Breisgau. In 1913, he filmed newsreels in the Balkans. He then became an assistant to Arnold Fanck, a leading director of Mountain films. He worked frequently with Luis Trenker and Leni Riefenstahl, both closely associated with the genre. He was Riefenstahl's lead cameraman on her 1935 propaganda film Triumph of the Will. During the Second World War, Allgeier filmed material for newsreels. He later worked in West German television. His son is the cinematographer Hans-Jörg Allgeier.
Leopold Blonder (1893–1932) was an Austrian art director active in the silent and early sound eras. He also directed five short films during the early 1920s. He worked on several mountain films with Arnold Fanck and Leni Riefenstahl.
The White Stadium is a 1928 Swiss documentary film directed by Arnold Fanck about the 1928 Winter Olympics which were held in the Swiss resort of St. Moritz. The film received the backing of the International Olympic Committee and was the first of the Winter Olympic feature films to be made. It was financed and distributed by the major German studio UFA, but was not a commercial or critical success.
Ernst Petersen was a German architect and actor. Although Petersen was very successful as an architect and several of his buildings are now listed as historical monuments, he achieved greater fame in the short period of time as an actor in mountain films alongside Leni Riefenstahl.
