Getting the Big Picture on Small Towns

Leni Riefenstahl, whose longevity has resulted in her becoming the world’s oldest living punching bag, is no more promoting fascism with her sensual photographs of the Nuba tribe than when she was glorifying Jesse Owens’ amazing performance in the 1936 Olympics.

She has recorded history with an artistic eye (or art with an historic eye!) longer than most people have been alive. It may be fair to critique ... but not to judge.

Those who automatically classify her as “Nazi filmmaker” and “Aryan supremacist” should look a little closer at her body of work. Owens and the Japanese marathon medalist in “Olympia” are cinematically deified. Her alleged prejudice against Gypsies while filming “Tiefland” can be countered with the fact that she was portraying a Gypsy character!

Riefenstahl has seemed to resign herself to the fact that her detractors are at least equal in number to her admirers. If she has ever displayed any real bias, it has been toward the athletic male form. And who can blame a gal for that?

NELSON ASPEN

Los Angeles