Thursday, February 25, 2010

Olympian Gods

Even for a brief, few seconds

Demigod, or falling angel?

Once again, I'm amazed at how many of these winter sports are full of dangers. But, since these athletes are really demigods, or close enough, they deliver almost every time.

Here is another daredevil sport - aerial skiing.

The performances reminded me of Leni Riefenstahl's Olympia, which showcased the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. Riefenstahl was Hitler's filmmaker, and her most famous film, Triumph of the Will, was filmed during the 1934 Nazi party congress in Nuremberg.

Olympia could also be titled, Triumph of Man. Here is a video of Riefenstahl's diving sequences in Olympia, where the athletes lose all contact with the ground and the people around them and just become god-like creatures floating in the air, defying gravity. Scroll to near the end of the clip to see the famous shots where she slowed down the film, reversed some shots, and took some upside down, removing any context (water and identifiable diving board) out of the shots, in order to glorify the athletes.

These aerial skiers had that same sense of invincibility, soaring for those brief minutes close to the heavens.