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Der Weisse Rausch (aka The Ski Chase and The White Ecstasy) was directed by Dr. Arnold Franck, the man who put the German "mountain film" genre on the map. The story concerns a group of young and healthy vacationers who meet annually at a Tyrolean skiing resort. Each year, hero Hanns Schneider (who also wrote the script) and heroine Leni Riefenstahl engage in a friendly rivalry on the slopes. As their expertise on skis grows with each passing day, so too does their love for one another. Filmed in 1931, Der Weisse Rausch was released in the U.S. in 1938, by which time the Jewish Hannes Schneider had been thrown into a Nazi work camp and actress-turned-director Leni Riefenstahl had become the "official" filmmaker of the Third Reich.