Luis Trenker

Luis Trenker studied at University of Graz and Graz University of Technology. The recorded working language is Italian, German and Ladin. Works named in the authority record are Der Kaiser von Kalifornien. Distinctions recorded are Bavarian Order of Merit, Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, Order of Merit of the Tyrol and Order of Karl Valentin.

Alois Franz Trenker was born on 4 October 1892 in Urtijëi, Tyrol (German: St. Ulrich in Gröden, Italian: Ortisei) in the Austro-Hungarian Empire (in present-day northern Italy). His father Jacob Trenker was a painter from North Tyrol, and his mother Karolina (née Demetz) was from Urtijëi in Val Gardena. He grew up speaking two languages: German, the language of his father, and Ladin, the language of his mother. He attended the local primary school from 1898 to 1901, and then attended the Josefinum in Bolzano in 1902 and 1903. From 1903 to 1905, he attended the arts and crafts school in Bolzano, where he developed his skills as a woodcarver. In 1912, he entered the Realschule in Innsbruck, where he studied Italian as a foreign language. There he began his middle school studies. During his high school years, he spent his holidays working for mountain guides and ski instructors. After his matriculation examinations in 1912, Trenker studied architecture at the Technical University in Vienna.

At the start of World War I, Trenker fought as a cadet in an Austro-Hungarian heavy artillery unit on the Eastern Front in Galicia and Russisch-Polen. From 1915 to 1918, he fought in the mountain war against Italy, from 1916 in one of the Mountain Guide Companies (k.k. Bergführerkompanien) in the Dolomites. At the end of the war he had achieved the rank of Lieutenant. He would write 23 books based on his war experiences, the most important of which were Fort Rocca Alta and Berge in Flammen, the latter of which was made into the 1931 film Mountains on Fire. At the end of the war, Trenker made several unsuccessful attempts to start an architecture business in Bolzano. In 1924 he graduated from the Technical University of Graz, and then worked as an architect in Bolzano, forming a business partnership with the Austrian architect Clemens Holzmeister. In 1924, Trenker participated in the Winter Olympic Games in Chamonix as a member of the Italian five-man bobsled team. Under the leadership of Pilot Lodovico Obexer, they ended up in sixth place.

Trenker's first contact with film came in 1921, when he helped director Arnold Fanck on one of his mountain films. The main actor could not perform the stunts required, and so Trenker assumed the leading role. He gradually assumed more roles on the set, and by 1928 was directing, writing, and starring in his own films. By then, he had abandoned his job as an architect to concentrate on his films. In 1928 he married Hilda von Bleichert, the daughter of a fabrics manufacturer from Leipzig, with whom he had four children. In 1932 Trenker created (with Curtis Bernhardt and Edwin H. Knopf) a historical film The Rebel. Trenker stated that the film's plotline of a Tyrolean mountaineer Severin Anderlan leading a revolt against occupying French forces in 1809, during the Napoleonic Wars. The greatest Tirolean patriot Andreas Hofer was a proto-type of "Severin Anderlan"... Trenker was designed to mirror what was happening in contemporary Germany as it rejected the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. The main theme of Trenker's work was the idealization of peoples connection with their homeland and pointing out the decadence of city life (most clearly visible in his 1934 film Der verlorene Sohn (The Prodigal Son). This loosely played into the hands of Nazi propagandists, who seized upon the nationalistic elements of his work. However, Trenker refused to allow his work to be subverted as such and eventually moved to Rome in 1940 to avoid further governmental pressure. After a pair of documentary films, however, Trenker returned to Bolzano and stopped making films. The style he had developed in the thirties was not limited to nationalistic, folkloristic, and heroic clichés. His impersonation of a hungry, downtrodden immigrant in depression era New York was regarded as one of the seminal scenes for future Italian neorealism by the likes of Roberto Rossellini.

Trenker was accused of fascist opportunism after the war, but the charges were eventually dropped. In the 1950s, he returned to the movie industry, though by 1965 he was making primarily documentary films that focused on the Austrian province of Tyrol and South Tyrol (his homeland), which had become part of Italy. He also returned to writing about the mountains.

In 1988 Hilda Trenker von Bleichert died. Luis Trenker died on 13 April 1990 in Bolzano at the age 97. He was buried in his family's plot at Urtijëi. In 1992, for the centennial of his birth, his native town of Ortisei dedicated a monument that shows him in mountaineer garb while looking at the Langkofel, a mountain he liked to climb. In March 2004, the Museum Gherdëina displayed a collection of Trenker's belongings from a bequest of his family.

Mountain of Destiny (1924), Der Berg des Schicksals, actor The Holy Mountain (1926), Der heilige Berg, actor The Great Leap (1927), Der große Sprung, actor Struggle for the Matterhorn (1928), Der Kampf ums Matterhorn, actor The Call of the North (1929), Der Ruf des Nordens, producer, actor The Son of the White Mountain (1930), Der Sohn der weißen Berge, director, story, actor The Great Longing (1930), Die große Sehnsucht, actor Les Chevaliers de la montagne (1930), Knights of the Mountains, writer, actor Die heiligen drei Brunnen (1930), actor Mountains on Fire (1931), Berge in Flammen, director, novel, screenplay, actor Doomed Battalion (1932), director, story, screenplay, actor The Rebel (1932), Der Rebell, director, story, actor The Prodigal Son (1934), director, novel, screenplay, actor Der Kaiser von Kalifornien (1936), producer, director, writer, actor Giovanni de Medici: The Leader (1937), director, story, screenplay, actor Condottieri (1937), director, story, screenplay, actor The Mountain Calls (1938), Der Berg ruft, director, writer, actor The Challenge (1938), director, actor Love Letters from Engadin (1938), Liebesbriefe aus dem Engadin, producer, director, writer, actor Boundary Fire (1939), producer Urlaub im Schnee (1939 short), producer The Fire Devil (1940), producer, director, writer, actor Der König der Berge (1940 short), producer, writer Pastor Angelicus (1942), director Germanin (1943), actor Monte Miracolo (1945), producer, director, screenplay, actor Barrier to the North (1950), Barriera a settentrione, Duell in den Bergen, director, writer, actor Aus König Laurins Rosengarten (1951), producer, actor Bergsommer (1952 short), producer An der Dolomitenstraße (1952 short), producer, director, writer Kleine Kletterfahrt (1952 short), producer, director, writer Niemals mutlos (1952 short), Don't Surrender Never!, producer, director, writer Gondelfahrt durch Venedig (1952 short), Venetian Walk, producer, director, writer Lofotenfischer (1952 short), The Lofoten Fisher, producer, director, writer Die Sphinx von Zermatt (1953 short), producer, director, writer Kavaliere im Eis (1954 short), producer, director, writer Escape to the Dolomites (1955), director, writer, actor S.O.S. Zinnennordwand (1955 short), director Gold aus Gletschern (1956), producer, director Von der Liebe besiegt (1956), director, novel, actor Wetterleuchten um Maria (1957), director Unser Freund, der Haflinger (1957 short), Our Friend Haflinger, producer, director Zwei Wege, ein Gipfel (1961 short), producer, director, writer His Best Friend (1962), His Best Friend, director, screenplay, actor Vacanze scambio (1962), director Luftsprünge (1969–70 television series), actor Skifreuden in den Dolomiten (1970 short), producer, director, writer Ich filmte am Matterhorn (1970), producer, director, writer Olympia (1971), actor Die Glückspirale (1971), actor Heimat aus Gottes Hand (1979), producer, director, writer Hochkant (1982), actor