Film suggests Nazis’ lead propagandist had role in 1939 massacre

A new documentary on the Nazis’ favourite film-maker and lead propagandist Leni Riefenstahl suggests she was a direct witness to murderous crimes of the Third Reich she later claimed to have known nothing about, and may even have contributed to one herself.

The film Riefenstahl, which premieres at the Venice film festival at the end of August, also claims that the propagandist admired the party and its henchmen until her death at 101 in 2003, a sentiment that ran counter to her insistence…