Leni Riefenstahl Bio/Wiki, Net Worth, Married 2018
Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl (German: [??i?f?n?ta?l]; 22 August 1902 – 8 September 2003) was a German film director, photographer, actress and dancer widely known for directing the Nazi propaganda film Triumph of the Will. Riefenstahl’s prominence in the Third Reich, along with her personal association with Adolf Hitler, destroyed her film career following Germany's defeat in World War II, after which she was arrested but released without any charges.Triumph of the Will gave Riefenstahl instant and lasting international fame, as well as infamy. She directed eight films, two of which received significant coverage outside Germany. The propaganda value of her films made during the 1930s repels most modern commentators, but many film histories cite the aesthetics as outstanding. The Economist wrote that Triumph of the Will "sealed her reputation as the greatest female filmmaker of the 20th century".In the 1970s, Riefenstahl published her still photography of the Nuba tribes in Sudan in several books such as The Last of the Nuba. Active until her death at age 101, she published marine life stills and released the marine-based film Impressionen unter Wasser in 2002.After her death, the Associated Press described Riefenstahl as an “acclaimed pioneer of film and photographic techniques”. Der Tagesspiegel newspaper in Berlin noted, “Leni Riefenstahl conquered new ground in the cinema”. The BBC said her documentaries “were hailed as groundbreaking film-making, pioneering techniques involving cranes, tracking rails, and many cameras working at the same time”.
If I, as so many other colleagues, would have worked for the sake of money, I could have become a millionaire. But money was of no importance to me. I worked on a film for years until I thought it artistically perfected. I was my own boss, nobody could tell me what to do. Had I ever had the impression that my freedom as a creative artist would be limited, I would have gone abroad.
2
I was never Hitler's mistress - although I was dazzled by him. These are nothing but lies. It is senseless to call me the queen of the Nazis. I have never spoken a word about politics. It is all lies and forgeries. If I had really been a Nazi I would have killed myself, like Eva Braun. I have never said that Hitler was handsome and intelligent. I am not an idiot. I have never seen mass executions and I have never seen a concentration camp.
3
Really, if I start a work I forget food. I forget that I am a woman. I forget my dress, I only see my work. I forget because I am fascinated by my work.
4
I told Hitler that filming the party congress was too difficult for a girl. I told him the men are jealous and the problems I encountered affected my nerves. Hitler became very angry. He told Goebbels that when he gave an order, Goebbels was supposed to obey it. Hitler then told me that I must make a film of the congress in 1934 but I protested, saying that the same thing would happen. He... assured me that there would be no interference.
5
[In a 1993 interview, commenting on her work with the Nazi party] "Being sorry isn't nearly enough, but I can't tear myself apart or destroy myself. It's so terrible. I've suffered anyway for over half a century and it will never end, until I die. It's such an incredible burden, that to say 'sorry'... it's inadequate, it expresses too little."
(August 22, 2003) Married for the 2nd time to her boyfriend of 35 years Horst Kettner on her 101st birthday and just 2 weeks before her death.
2
A band called the World/Inferno Friendship Society has a song out called "Leni at the End of Time.".
3
Holds the record for the longest length of time in between projects. After Lowlands (1954), it was 48 years before she directed another film, the documentary Impressionen unter Wasser (2002). She's also the oldest director to helm a documentary. She was 99 when she made the latter film.
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Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890- 1945". Pages 952-957. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.
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In an interview shortly before her death, she stated that if she had known that Triumph of the Will (1935) would have haunted her career, she would have never made it.
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A film of her life is being developed by Jodie Foster, who will direct and star in the piece.
7
Ms. Riefenstahl lied about her age in 1973 to be passed an official licence to go deep-diving in the Pacific Ocean. She started collecting images of the underwater beauty then, and she did not stop when a shark showed his appreciation of her by head-butting her 3 times, as documented on a TV documentary in 2002.
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She says she read Ernest Hemingway's "Green Hills of Africa" (1935) in 1955 and prepared immediately to visit the Sudan, which she did the following year, was accepted by and lived with the Nuba people for several months. She wrote three books, mainly photographic essays documenting the vanishing beauty of African people and cultures, from 1972 to 1997. Those are possibly her best refutations of accusations of her racist philosophy as the director of Olympia Part One: Festival of the Nations (1938).
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In early 2000, the 97 year old Riefensthal spent several weeks recovering in hospital after suffering broken ribs and lung injuries after being involved in a helicopter crash whilst filming in Sudan.
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Robert von Dassanowsky considers Lowlands (1954) to be Riefenstahl's cinematic statement on her rejection of Hitler and the Nazi regime.
$5 Million
