Hi, everyone!

If you’re interested in reading this in preparation for tomorrow’s planned discussion of Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will”, here is the celebrity movie critic Roger Ebert’s review of the film. Ebert brings up two points that we touched upon in class yesterday. Firstly, we talked about the effectiveness of the film as a piece of propaganda. There seemed to be some agreement that Riefenstahl’s film is more effective than Frank Capra’s “Why We Fight” films, which use a less powerful lecture style in the form of a voice-over. Ebert brings up the question of whether Riefenstahl’s film is useful only in its ability to strengthen the convictions of people who already support Hitler and the Nazi Party (does it have the potential to win new converts?). Secondly, we contrasted this film with Capra’s films in regard to the issue of credibility. We emphasized the extent to which the images in Capra’s films are fabricated, but Ebert casts into serious doubt the authenticity of the images in Riefenstahl’s film. I hope you find the review interesting, even if you take issue with Ebert’s opinions on this film (or others)!

-Casey Bodden

Roger Ebert’s review: http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=%2F20080626%2FREVIEWS08%2F911177318%2F1023

Robert Ebert’s blog post, which he wrote before the publication of the review: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/06/triumph_over_triumph_of_the_wi.html