Mark Steyn: The Love That Doesn't Like You Speaking Its Name

I e-mailed Steyn with the following question"
Good luck. But don't hold your breath, he's a busy man

It turns out I don't have to. Steyn's tribute to her follows his article at the head of this thread. Here it is

Leni Riefenstahl was a brilliant cinematographer and editor who could compose and edit anything, except, in the end, her own life. If only she’d been able to snip one problematic decade out of her 101 years, we’d know her as a game old gal who in her 60s went off to live with an African tribe, in her 70s learned to scuba dive, and at the age of 98 survived a plane crash in the Sudan.

If only it weren’t for that awkward patch…

In the 1930s, Fraulein Riefenstahl put her formidable film-making talents to the cause of the Third Reich, and produced one of the most remarkable films ever made: Triumph Of The Will. Granted that audiences were a lot less media savvy in 1934 and granted that a people dumb enough to fall for National Socialism will fall for anything, it’s still hard to believe that even in its day anyone accepted what remained Fraulein Riefenstahl’s official explanation to the end – that this was just a “documentary record” of the 1934 annual party convention. Whatever Triumph Of The Will is, it’s not a documentary. Its language is that of feature films – not Warner Brothers gangster movies or John Ford westerns, but rather the supersized genres, the epics and musicals where huge columns of the great unwieldy messy mass of humanity get tidied and organized – and, if that isn’t the essence of fascism, what is? Today, you can see Riefenstahl’s influence in the work of George Lucas (Star Wars) and Paul Verhoeven (Starship Troopers), both film-makers for whom the principal thrill of directing seems to be the opportunity it affords to subordinate the individual.

Her directing career died with the Third Reich. “Art is my life and I was deprived of it,” said Leni Riefenstahl. Tough. Whatever her disclaimers, she made evil look better than it had any right to: a cautionary tale in the art of film.

Someone made a documentary of Reifenstal's life in which she explains what she did and why she did it. Steyn is far too glib in his descriptions...but he does recognize the power of art - particularly in his last sentence.

Sorry, you do. The art that you see is filtered by the "art world."

Wrong again. I just can't be lazy and uninterested. Great fortunes have been repeatedly made by perceptive people with taste of their own and the courage to pursue it...and the Internet has made it so much easier.

Pablo Picasso

I have my own view of Picasso's work. I'd care about what others say only if I find their views insightful or if I were trying to put a price on one of his pieces.

Question here. I agree the US government never blacklisted actors/writers/directors, but my issue with HUAC is more along the lines of, why did they try to finger commie Hollywood types in the first place?

If somebody was advocating the violent overthrow of the US government to impose communism, I do see that as something the government should be concerned about.

I am troubled though about our government trying to figure out if a sitcom writer ever was a member of the communist party and to grill them under oath.

Should we have in the 90's, grilled every person who intellectually agreed with the militia movement? I am just wondering if the cure is greater than the disease? A limousine communist in Hollywood, who wanted the workers to unite, and was actually more of a socialist, than a hardcore commie, was probably being swept up in this. They may be wrong, wrong about politics, economics, ideology, but, so what? As long as they weren't spying for the Soviet Union, what business is it of the federal government if they wanted a Utopian world where everybody sang kumbaya while they shared all the wealth? It doesn't work that way, but I don't think it's a federal offense.

The times were different, and tough measures needed to be taken, against people who were fronting for the U.S.S.R., but I am a bit of a civil libertarian when there is no justification for abridging somebody's constitutional, and God Given right to believe something foolish.

Question here. I agree the US government never blacklisted actors/writers/directors, but my issue with HUAC is more along the lines of, why did they try to finger commie Hollywood types in the first place?

First, I think we have to consider the HUAC in the context of the time. Communism worldwide was on quite a roll, the Soviets controlling Eastern Europe & getting both the atom & hydrogen bomb, China just going “Red”, etc. TV was just a new medium and unquestionable film just as much, if not more, an influence on the culture as it is today. In that context I can understand the fear of communist influence on the US.

If somebody was advocating the violent overthrow of the US government to impose communism, I do see that as something the government should be concerned about. I am troubled though about our government trying to figure out if a sitcom writer ever was a member of the communist party and to grill them under oath.

Agreed. The whole thing is troubling.

The times were different, and tough measures needed to be taken, against people who were fronting for the U.S.S.R., but I am a bit of a civil libertarian when there is no justification for abridging somebody's constitutional, and God Given right to believe something foolish.

Again I agree. But if ‘Hollywood’ would have stood up to the Committee, they could have called their bluff. As Steyn called it a ...moment of colossal Hollywood cowardice any obstacle.... had he chosen to, Wasserman and his talent agency could have broken the blacklist as decisively as he broke the studio system.

We, the people, and even ‘Hollywood’, ARE the government. WE are responsible for OUR government.

I’m just tired of the Hollywood-types blaming the government on one hand for a non-existent blacklist, and on the other hand sucking up to liberal politicians trying to make this country as socialistic as possible.

Bottom line; communism bad, communist in Hollywood bad, and the methods (HUAC) our government employed in the late ‘40s-early ’50s were troubling. And to the actors who feel they must be active in politics or on some crusade during their down time between movies; JUST SHUT UP.

"Secondly -- because he was a black man (and a very dark-skinned black man at that), he was disrespected and stifled in a society that in word, but not deed, rewarded those with the aforementioned qualities."

And by disrespected you mean being given a four year scholarship to Rutgers University in 1915. Becoming a twelve letter athlete excelling in baseball, basketball, football, and track and named to the All American Football team on two occasions. And being named a Phi Beta Kappa scholar and belonging to the Cap & Skull Honor Society, and being selected valedictorian of his class in 1919? Getting a law degree from Columbia (again on scholarship)?

And I won't even get into the endless plaudits, honors and moneny he got as an actor and singer.

Yeah, American society just scorned the hell out him! He would've gotten much better treatment in life in the USSR. LOL

"Question here. I agree the US government never blacklisted actors/writers/directors, but my issue with HUAC is more along the lines of, why did they try to finger commie Hollywood types in the first place?"

HUAC was the brainchild of the KGB. It was pushed into being by a Congressman on the KGB payroll. Its purpose was to "finger" anti-Communists, most especially Germans, and particularly fascists and Nazi-sympathizers.

A lot of Germans and German supporters were locked up, lost careers, etc., thanks to the early work of the committee. We never hear much about that. HUAC's work only came under scrutiny when they started going after Communists.

You can look it up.

Getting a law degree from Columbia (again on scholarship)?

You've done some research, it seems. So it won't be hard for you to answer this: Why didn't Robeson ever practice law with that well-earned degree?

Well, the usual story is that he was so offended when a white secretary wouldn't take dictation from him that he followed his wife's advice to look for work in the theater.

http://www.websn.com/Pride/Pride/paul_robeson.htm

The only trouble with that story is that he had already appeared on Broadway and on the London West End stage while in law school.

http://c250.columbia.edu/c250_celebrates/remarkable_columbians/paul_robeson.html

So one suspects he preferred the fame and money of show business to "slaving" away in a law office somewhere in obscurity.

"I'm glad what he done to 'em."