Belief & Beauty

At its peak, the Hitler Youth organization in Germany boasted over eight million members. The Belief and Beauty Society for females 17-21 was a tie-in between the league of German Girls and the Nazi Frauenschaft. The idea was that girls should take part in the work of the whole Volksgemeinschaft/People’s Community before they went on to jobs or---ideally---to marry and have children. Former members and leaders of the League of German Girls---Dr. Jutta Reudiger and leader of the Belief and Beauty Society Clementine zu Castell---recall the League from its beginnings to the end of the war. To expand the education of female youth, National Youth Leader Baldur von Schirach founded the BDM Belief and Beauty Society on January 19, 1938. In 1938 and 1939, the film Belief and Beauty was created by order of the National Youth Leadership. Hinrich Medau---founder of the Medau gymnastics school---and Clementine zu Castell were able to get “Hitler’s photographer” Hans Ertl’s cooperation in making this film. Filmed in the unmistakable style of director Leni Riefenstahl, this first-ever documentary on the society was to open in German theaters in October 1939, but Nazi Minister of Propaganda Dr. Joseph Goebbels prohibited the film’s release due to the outbreak of World War II. The DVD includes the actual never-before-released 1938 film Belief and Beauty..