City of Toys (2024, 39mins) combines Alan Marcusâ 2001 interview with legendary filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl with an exploration of centuries of antisemitism. As she recalls of her iconic 1935 documentary, Triumph of the Will, on the annual Nuremberg Nazi Party Rally almost seventy years later: âI had no ideals. I only did my duty. It was a commission I carried out.â Beyond its notoriety in 20th century history, Nuremberg was also known as one of the toymaking capitals of the world and until the Nazi era many of its major toymakers were Jewish. Nuremberg still hosts the worldâs largest trade toy fair. The film subtly intertwines narratives on Adolf Hitler and Riefenstahlâs representation of the Nazi movement with Nurembergâs historical bedrock of antisemitism and the role of its Jewish toymakers. As film historian Robert Rosenstone has written of Marcusâ work, âI would call it a kind of poetic history that may in fact deny the possibility of history at all.â
Writer
Alan Marcus
