Directed by Arnold Fanck and Othmar Gurtner • 1928 • Switzerland
THE WHITE STADIUM (Das Weisse Stadion), the film of the II Olympic Winter Games St. Moritz 1928 in Switzerland, holds particular interest because it was directed by Arnold Fanck, a geologist turned filmmaker known for his sumptuous outdoor cinematography and his aesthete's eye for filming natural landscapes. On a technical level, THE WHITE STADIUM exemplifies the rapid progress in Olympic films where cameras and montage are concerned.
Up Next in 100 Years of Olympic Films: 1912–2012
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The IX Olympiad in Amsterdam
1928 • Italy
Made by Istituto Luce, the Italian film company controlled by Benito Mussolini since 1925, THE IX OLYMPIAD IN AMSTERDAM may, understandably, highlight Italian participants, but it is the first Olympic documentary that describes the techniques of certain events with useful particulars
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The Olympic Games, Amsterdam 1928
Directed by Wilhelm Prager and Jules Perel • 1928 • Netherlands
Though shorter than the Italian film covering the same 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, the intimacy on display in this Dutch film is more rewarding and less perfunctory.
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Youth of the World
Directed by Carl Junghans • 1936 • Germany
This film, like Leni Riefenstahl's infamous OLYMPIA, was produced by Adolf Hitler's Reichsfilmkammer. YOUTH OF THE WORLD, a celebration of the 1936 Winter Games, may forgo narration, but its visuals throb with kinetic energy and visual poetry.
