The discovery of new, unseen footage, breathes new life into the extraordinary Metropolis.
Upon it’s release in 1927, Fritz Lang’s Metropolis was a was a critical and box office failure. It was Germany's UFA’s biggest budgeted movie consuming over half of the annual budget, almost bringing the studio to its knees. Lang cast 2000 extras, alone (and almost killing the lead twice!). Yet, it is one of the most exceptional films in cinematic history.
It has influenced many a modern day classic, along the likes of Star Wars, Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey and even The Matrix series. Technically groundbreaking at the time, it is a visual masterpiece, infused with Expressionistic imagery to portray urban hell. What is extraordinary is that the futuristic film predicts a self-destructive society not unlike the one that exists today, visualizing technological advances such as video-phones. It is also one of the first disaster films.
Despite its cult status, and the many restorations to reconstruct the film, it fails to engage a wide audience - perhaps dismissed by most, as a silent film. With the surfacing of unseen footage, found in 2008 in Argentina, this could give Metropolis the attention it deserves.
The film opens, with a bird’s eye view of the vast and magnificent Metropolis, a name derived from the Greeks and means ‘mother city’. It is set in the distant future of the year 2001 (some say 2026), dark shadows emphasizing the daunting skyscrapers, entwined with suspended motorways, and surrounded by biplanes. The overcrowded city’s success is based upon the unrelenting work undertaken by the underground slaves, who are presented as lifeless cogs of a machine; whilst the wealthy enjoy the spoils of the land, living high up, in the luxury.
Freder (Frohlich), the pampered son of John Fredersen (Abel), the power-obsessed ruler of Metropolis, squanders his days in The Pleasure Garden. One day, he catches of a beautiful woman with a group of the worker's children. She is Maria (Helm), a revolutionist who preaches to crowds of slaves that there is a better way of life. He then becomes concerned with the workers plight and worries that the huge numbers will uprise and rebel against his father. Meanwhile, John has plans of his own, plotting to thwart any rebellion with the aid of the mad scientist Rotwang (Klein-Rogge), who has invented robot replicas of human beings. Ferder uncovers the plot and starts a revolution. Rotwang kidnaps the real Maria and uses her robotic replica to convince the workers to rise up. The city gets flooded and Maria regains the workers' trust after a robot had stolen her identity and the workers makes peace with the master.
The screenplay is based upon a less successful book written by Lang’s wife Thea Von Harbou. Each of the two mediums suffer from undeveloped plotlines of a complex story, however, where the film succeeds over the original source, is in it ambitious and grand production. For one, the synchronized movement of hundreds of workers walking to and from work, as they march with their heads down, dressed in uniforms and caps. Portrayed as mere components of a sinister looking machine which appears like a gigantic evil monster, consuming the workers, who they are immediately replaced by their peers, to continue the labour. Injured men are carried away on stretchers, seemingly unnoticed. It does not go unnoticed that Metropolis is Hitler’s favourite film, released was 20 years before the second World War.
Brigette Helm excels in her numerous roles within the film and almost, quite literally, died for her heart; once by a fall and the other by the fact that the bonfire scene was actually real! She refused to work with real-life taskmaster, Fritz Lang, thereafter. Maria is the virtuous heroine, not unlike the biblical Madonna, whilst robot Maria is clearly represents the Whore of Babylon. The robot Maria provides some of the movie's most iconic images, as she performs an erotic dance in a nightclub, driving the wealthy men into a sexual frenzy, bewitched by the twitching movements of her head and torso, lingering half-winks and mischievous grins.
Receiving rave reviews at the 60th Berlinale (Berlin International Film Festival), this is considered to be one of the biggest of all film finds. Newly reconstructed and restored, featuring almost 30 minutes of footage previously thought lost to the world, for the first time in 83 years (since materials were cut and lost following the film's 1927 première), viewers can see the director's visionary epic on the big screen, in all its original glory. Don’t miss out!
