Short and Sweet
Two friends fall in love with the dancer Diotima. During a climbing expedition in the mountains, they get into an argument, and the younger man falls over a rocky ledge. The older friend manages to hold onto him but is unable to pull him up. A snowstorm approaches, and the older friend, hallucinating, envisions himself and Diotima approaching an altar in an icy world. He attempts to move towards her but ends up plunging both himself and his friend to their deaths. The rescue team organized by Diotima arrives too late.
This is Arnold Fanck’s first mountain film featuring Leni Riefenstahl and Luis Trenker.
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Arnold Fanck (* March 6, 1889, in Frankenthal; † September 28, 1974, in Freiburg im Breisgau) was a German director and pioneer of the mountain film genre.
Fanck studied and earned a doctorate in geology and worked as a ski instructor. In 1913, he made a documentary film about the ascent of Monte Rosa and has since been considered a pioneer of mountain, sports, ski, and nature films.
In 1920, he founded the “Berg- und Sportfilm GmbH Freiburg” in Freiburg im Breisgau with Odo Deodatus I. Tauern, Bernhard Villinger, and Rolf Bauer. His team included Sepp Allgeier and Hans Schneeberger, two other camera pioneers of mountain films who later joined Leni Riefenstahl’s team. He collaborated with Luis Trenker on *Der Berg des Schicksals* (1924) and with Leni Riefenstahl from *Der heilige Berg* (1926) onward.
Fanck gained international recognition with the mountain drama *Die weiße Hölle vom Piz Palü* (1928), for which he engaged Georg Wilhelm Pabst as co-director, and especially with *Der weiße Rausch* (1931). He filmed his movies almost exclusively on location, such as *SOS Eisberg* (1932), set and filmed in Greenland. Fanck was known for not sparing his actors during shoots to achieve dramatic and convincing shots.
In *Die weiße Hölle vom Piz Palü*, he had a snow wall detonated above actress Leni Riefenstahl to create the desired dramatic effect in the scenes.
During the Nazi era, he initially refused to collaborate with Joseph Goebbels’ Ministry of Propaganda. He began work on *Der ewige Traum/Der König vom Mont-Blanc* in 1934, a film about French heroes on French mountains, which also involved a Jewish producer, Gregor Rabinowitsch, through the Cine-Allianz. This conflict led to financial difficulties, which he only overcame in 1936 through a commission from the Japanese Ministry of Culture.
With *Die Tochter des Samurai* and other “cultural films,” Fanck decided to cooperate with fascist propaganda. Soon after, he made *Ein Robinson* (1938/39), a propaganda film for Bavaria Filmkunst. Fanck joined the NSDAP in April 1940, but his documentaries on New Berlin, the Atlantic Wall, sculptors Arno Breker and Josef Thorak were no longer independently produced by him but by Leni Riefenstahl Filmproduktion, meaning he completed his last films under the direction of his former pupil.
After World War II, his works from the Nazi era were banned by the Allied military governments. Fanck no longer received commissions, fell into poverty, and worked as a forest laborer.
**Filmography (Selection):**
– 1920 – *Das Wunder des Schneeschuhs*
– 1921 – *Im Kampf mit dem Berge*
– 1922 – *Eine Fuchsjagd auf Skiern durchs Engadin*
– 1924 – *Der Berg des Schicksals*
– 1926 – *Der heilige Berg*
– 1927 – *Der große Sprung*
– 1928 – *Der Kampf ums Matterhorn* (Screenplay; directed by Nunzio Malasomma, Mario Bonnard)
– 1928 – *Das weiße Stadion*
– 1929 – *Die weiße Hölle vom Piz Palü*
– 1930 – *Stürme über dem Montblanc*
– 1931 – *Der weiße Rausch*
– 1933 – *SOS Eisberg*
– 1934 – *Der ewige Traum*
– 1937 – *Die Tochter des Samurai*
– 1940 – *Ein Robinson – Das Tagebuch eines Matrosen*
– 1941 – *Kampf um den Berg – Eine Hochtour vor 20 Jahren*
– 1943 – *Josef Thorak – Werkstatt und Werk*
– 1944 – *Arno Breker – Harte Zeit, starke Kunst*
– 1944 – *Atlantik-Wall*