Die weiße Hölle vom Piz Palü

In the 20's and 30's of the last century Arnold Fanck specialised in what we may call "Mountain films". In these films the mountains are characters of their own (they can be irritated and turn themselves against their climbers) but for the rest the films mostly lack full fledged stories. As such they resemble nature documentaries.

In "Die weisse Hölle vom Piz Palu" renowned director Georg Wilhelm Pabst was brought in to "repair" this lack of a plot.

My guess is that the scenes in the village and the mountan cabin are predominantly Pabst and the mountain scenes are predominantly Fanck. The mountain cabin scenes are about jealousy and rivalry (the man of a young couple senses that his fiancé is impressed by an experienced climber and wants to prove himself) The mountain scens are about heroism and self sacrifice when the three of them got into trouble in the mountains.

The self sacrifice is sometimes interpreted as having a hint of Nazi ideology (dying for your country). I wonder if this interpretation is influenced by the later career of Leni Riefenstahl, who in this film is "only" actress?

Apart from the story the beautiful images of the Fanck film are also there. They have been shot under difficult circumstances, the whole crew (from actors to cinematographers) being experienced moutaineers. I would like to call atention to the scene in which a rescue team with burining torches moves into the mountains and also to the scene in which the rescue team searches inside an ice crevasse.