Summer Cinema IPN Prague: Riefenstahl

As a filmmaker, Leni Riefenstahl created iconic images of the Nazi era - and after World War II spent the rest of her life denying any ideological proximity to the regime. She refused to acknowledge any connection between her art celebrating beauty, health and strength, and the terror perpetrated by the regime. She permitted only one version of her biography: her own.

The legacy of one of the twentieth century's most controversial women tells a different story. Private films and photographs, recorded telephone conversations with her associates, and personal letters raise the question: how could she rise to the position of the Reich's leading filmmaker while persistently denying close ties to Hitler and Goebbels?

Andreas Veiel's documentary, made in collaboration with television journalist Sandra Maischberger and bearing the simple title Riefenstahl, assembles these fragments together and places them in a broader historical context.