The Globe And Mail
Tue Feb 9 2010
Page: A16
Section: Sports: Olympic Games
Byline: Marsha Lederman
Dateline: VANCOUVER
VANCOUVER — Those on their way to run with the Olympic torch in the Lower Mainland were still being shown a controversial video yesterday, despite promises from VANOC last week that the video had been withdrawn.
The video includes footage from the film Olympia, directed by Leni Riefenstahl, who made propaganda films for Adolf Hitler, most notably Triumph of the Will.
One of Riefenstahl’s shots was altered in the VANOC video to obscure the Nazi salute.
VANOC announced last week that it would no longer show the video, after historians and the Canadian Jewish Congress were quoted by The Globe and Mail saying they were upset about the use of the footage. The decision to drop the video was applauded by the CJC Pacific Region.
But the video has been played at least twice since then – on Saturday, on a shuttle bus filled with torchbearers in Whistler, and again yesterday, on a shuttle bus in Langley.
A VANOC spokeswoman attributed the continued showing of the “retired” video to human error.
“We’ve let everybody know now three times,” she said. “We’ll just have to follow up again.”
Since the torch relay began more than three months ago, torchbearers have been shown the video on shuttle buses on the way to their spots along the route, in an effort to build excitement for the run.
The video, called Lights Will Guide You Home, includes footage of great moments in Canadian Winter Olympics history, and more recent torch-relay footage.
But it also includes a shot of a torchbearer entering an enormous stadium during the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. In Olympia, German spectators inside the stadium are clearly seen performing the Nazi salute.
The VANOC video obscures this by framing the shot in black.
The VANOC spokeswoman said the torchbearer manager would be calling torch handlers individually to remind them that they shouldn’t be showing the video any more. “At this point, they should no longer be showing it,” she said.
