![]() The opening is famous, seeming to be located in a city of clouds, an aerial landscape that might suggest Valhalla. Despite all the uniforms on display in Triumph of the Will, what you’re seeing are party members and members of paramilitary civilian organizations, not soldiers. Continuing the film chronicle: the army wasn’t happy with their brief appearance here so Riefenstahl had to make another movie, Day of Freedom, featuring the troops. The events of the previous year are silent subtext to all this, never directly referenced or referred to beyond mention of a “dark shadow” that had passed over the movement. Their new commander, Viktor Lutze, is prominently displayed throughout, and both he and Hitler make speeches about how old wounds have been healed. Hence, a new movie, with an overriding message of party unity. Röhm, along with much of the SA hierarchy, had been purged in the Night of the Long Knives, and for obvious reasons Hitler wanted them erased from the historical record. ![]() In particular, in 1933 Hitler had been paired with the head of the SA (the stormtroopers, or brownshirts), Ernst Röhm. It was basically a dry run for this film, a way of showing Hitler what might be done along these lines. The year before, Leni Riefenstahl had made a record of the fifth party rally, titled The Victory of Faith. This is a record of the 1934 sixth annual Nazi party rally at Nuremberg. As Rudolf Hess shouts at the end (they are the final lines we hear before the closing anthem): “The party is Hitler! But Hitler is Germany, and Germany is Hitler!” ![]() This film was “commissioned by order of the Fuhrer.” No name, or even official title, necessary. He was now simply the Leader, a radical point that this movie was made to both announce and promote. ![]() Adolf Hitler was already Reich chancellor when, after the death of Hindenburg, he became Reich president as well. ![]()
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