While the Music Played by Nathaniel Lande

Author:Nathaniel Lande
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Published: 2020-03-19T23:12:20+00:00

MEETING

LENI RIEFENSTAHL

Near the cabinet room, ever-delusional Joseph Goebbels, the notorious propaganda minister, sat dwarfed by a desk as exaggerated as his imposing Berlin office.

“There’s someone waiting to meet you: Leni Riefenstahl.”

Viktor was surprised. He had seen her perform as a dancer and actress prior to her liaison with Hitler, before she became one of the premier film directors in the world. Her films, Triumph of the Will, for the 1934 Nuremberg Rally, and Olympia, the documentary on the 1936 Olympic Games, had become legendary, seen around the world, winning gold medals in both Paris and Venice.

“She admires your work, Captain.”

“What does she have in mind?”

“A collaboration. Two great artists. She is waiting for you in your office.”

When Viktor introduced himself, he was amazed how small and slight she was, and how her face was reminiscent of the kind seen in so many classic films. Confident and comfortable, she sat in his small but well-appointed office, surrounded by signed photographs of all the musicians he admired.

“Captain Mueller, at last. I’ve admired your productions.”

“Thank you, Fräulein Riefenstahl.”

“Leni, please.”

“Leni, yes, of course. Let me say how impressed I am by the way you have revolutionized film, how you see through the lens so differently.”

Riefenstahl had practically invented tracking shots, and inventive pans from cranes, and even built trenches to shoot upward with elongated shots. She had a cinematic eye and had single-handedly given film a different perspective. She had five hundred searchlights form a circle at fifty-foot intervals, shooting into the sky at night forming a cathedral of light creating an image that was not only impressive and unforgettable, but burned forever into the minds of everyone who was there.

He continued. “You’ll have to come to Munich next week. There will be a premier of a new production.”

“I know your work, Viktor. I believe the Führer would like for us to work together.”

“But I am not practiced in film. I know a little about stagecraft, but film is a different medium, one I’ve not explored.”

“I appreciate your use of multimoving stages, film projection, and music integrated into your productions. I want to do the same. What I envision is seventy-millimeter film to project on very large screens, and I will need one of your amphitheaters to create this kind of cinema. Special speakers and projectors. I have a plan to have both moving screens and moving projectors and integrated live performance. I know film; you know theater. I need your knowledge and technology, and I need to understand the way you direct your cast, to create emotion. I want to do on film what you do onstage, to engage and capture my audience.”

“Have you the authority for this?”

“Our Führer has allowed me to work in complete freedom, just as he has done for you. He would like for us to work together.”

Viktor knew Riefenstahl was a great artist, but he was curious. Was she just a gifted filmmaker in love with her art? Or an instrument of the Reich? Or simply a supreme

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