100
Leni Riefenstahl, Hitler's personal filmmaker, turned 100 today. The former "Nazi Pin-Up Girl" remains unrepentant about her role in glamorizing the Third Reich. To Reifenstahl, Triumph of the Will and Olympia were not propaganda films. They were art.
I suppose that, in a way, it is sad that Riefenstahl is still branded by the work she did for Hitler. Of course, if not for that work, she probably would have been just another starving Berlin auteur, trying to find a sponsor to bankroll her floundering filmmaking dreams.
Perhaps if she had shown a bit more contrition, I could forgive her transgressions. Considering that her work glorified a regime responsible for the extermination of 6 million innocent Jews, she should consider herself fortunate that she was not on the docket at Nuremberg.
