FILM REVIEW: (the “complete”) Metropolis
© A.J. Malouin 2010
(Rating: 2 by A.J. Malouin.)
(See our side-bar page “How We Rate Movies”)
(1927/Germnany. Directed by Fritz Lang, who also worked on the script.)
If you had to pick only one film to carry around with you forever, it would (or “should,” at least) be this version of “Metropolis.”
First screened in 1927, “Metropolis” instantly became a “classic,” and has influenced, inspired, (and provided material for!) countless films since then.
The film first screened in Berlin, in 1927, at a running time of 153 minutes. It was so popular, however, that distributors Immediately started hacking into it, cutting it down in order to have show screenings daily in their theatres. At one point, an 87-minute version was being showed.
This was a shame and a crime, as “Metropolis,” as originally envisioned, is one of the most inventive projects ever filmed.
“Metropolis” features a brilliant modern city above ground; a workers’ dungeon of a factory underground; a Garden of Eden that will make you both blush and smile, a cast comprised of thousands and thousands of extras; scenes that are considered sexually charged even by today’s standards; special effects that are mind-popping (and done without computers!); a morality play of Right & Wrong; a science-fiction theme that outshines “Frankenstein;” set designs that are unbelievable in their scope and complexity, and an end-of-the-world flood that inspires True Terror in the audience while destroying an entire city on the screen.
…And all of this is done on a sound stage, and all at an expense previously unimaginable in the history of film-production budgets.
In a city of The Future, the Beautiful People, the thinkers, the visionaries, and the Captains of Industry live in a bright, airy, luxurious city of skyscrapers.
The workers responsible for creating and maintaining that city, however, live totally underground in their own drab light- and life-less city. They work several elevators floors below that, at an even-deeper level where they toil in 12-hour shifts of unbelievable sweat and monotony.
The two groups are interdependent, but totally isolated from each other.
A Prophetess preaches in the catacombs of the deepest most-ancient level of all, forecasting to the workers the arrival of a “Mediator” who will join the minds of those above ground with the hearts of those living underground, thus forming a society in which all brothers are equal.
Meanwhile, an inventor above ground attempts to create a machine so life-like that it will actually eliminate the need for Man.
A False Prophet arises underground, and leads the multitude of workers an a stunning rampage of self-destruction.
The mediator arrives, led by his love of Mankind…and of one woman in particular.
The leader of the above-ground Metropolis hires the most-sinister on-screen villain ever, to spy on the leader’s son.
Will it all end well? We can only hope so! While we are hoping, however, we will be treated to what is probably the greatest spectacle ever filmed.
It’s a spectacle restored close to the original in 2008, thanks to a 16-mm print of the original film, lost for years before being discovered in Buenos Aires. While there are still six minutes missing from this 2008 restoration, it is the closest thing yet to the vision that Fritz Lang wanted you to see.
If you’re within a couple hundred miles of the Detroit Film Theatre, you can see it *this* weekend, on a bright, new, huge screen installed just last weekend in this national treasure of a film theatre.
You’ll kick yourself if you miss it…and that’s never pleasant.
(2 hr 27. Not rated in the USA. A silent film, with title cards. With Alfred Abel as Joh Fredersen, Gustav Fröhlich as Freder [Joh Fredersen’s son,] Rudolf Klein-Rogge as C. A. Rotwang (the inventor,) Fritz Rasp as The Thin Man, Theodor Loos as Josaphat, Erwin Biswanger as Worker Number 11811 [Georgy,] Heinrich George as Grot [the guardian of the Heart Machine,] and Brigitte Helm as Maria and The Robot.)