Das Wunder des Schneeschuhs
A documentary about skiing at the beginning of the century.
Arnold Fanck
Director
Also Directed by Arnold Fanck
Leni, a daring young girl, is visiting for the second time a ski-resort. The local ski-teachers agree to organize a "fox-hunt" for her. Leni and Hannes are "the foxes", and about 40 other skiers will have to catch them, starting with a 15 minutes delay. It's not the story that makes this film, but the extremely spectacular, thrilling shots about skiing.
The cloud phenomena of Maloja are so well-known that some of them have names, such as the Maloja snake, a cloud bank that winds its way through the Alpine pass like a river. Clouds pass overhead, Fanck films them, just sufficiently to get the idea, among the crags of the Engadine, and gradually he connotes the wider scene, peopling the solitude and stillness below with a person or two, boating.
A young Italian girl living in the Dolomites falls in love with a member of a tourist party skiing on the nearby mountains.
Professional dancer Diotima finds herself the apex of a love triangle when she is pursued by two mountain climbers, Vigo and his unnamed older friend.
IM KAMPF MIT DEM BERGE: IN STURM UND EIS, a mountain-and-snow adventure film directed by his friend Arnold Fanck in 1920.
