In a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city's mastermind falls in love with a working-class prophet who predicts the coming of a... Read allIn a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city's mastermind falls in love with a working-class prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.In a futuristic city sharply divided between the working class and the city planners, the son of the city's mastermind falls in love with a working-class prophet who predicts the coming of a savior to mediate their differences.
- Awards
- 7 wins & 6 nominations total
Fritz Alberti
- Schöpferischer Mensch
- (uncredited)
- …
Grete Berger
- Arbeiterin
- (uncredited)
- …
Olly Boeheim
- Arbeiterin
- (uncredited)
- …
Max Dietze
- Arbeiter
- (uncredited)
- …
Ellen Frey
- Arbeiterin
- (uncredited)
- …
Beatrice Garga
- Frau der ewigen Gärten
- (uncredited)
- …
Heinrich Gotho
- Zermonienmeister
- (uncredited)
- …
Dolly Grey
- Arbeiterin
- (uncredited)
- …
Anny Hintze
- Frau der ewigen Gärten
- (uncredited)
- …
Gottfried Huppertz
- Man Playing Violin
- (uncredited)
Summary
Reviewers say 'Metropolis' is a groundbreaking science fiction film that delves into class struggle, technological dangers, and social harmony. Its innovative visual style, special effects, and set design have inspired films like 'Blade Runner' and 'Star Wars'. The dystopian city depiction and commentary on labor and consumerism remain impactful. Celebrated for its cinematography, editing, and symbolism, 'Metropolis' stands as a key work of German expressionism, though some find its pacing and narrative dated.
Featured reviews
Technically speaking, I have seen this Fritz Lang silent sci-fi before, but this was the first time I saw it in any shape by which I could fairly evaluate it. I had previously watched Metropolis on a public domain VHS from the 80s. The print was terribly scratched and while there were a few memorable images, the story was so incoherent that their context was usually unclear. Though this was clearly not the best way to see Metropolis, I was still left with an impression of this supposed classic as a dusty museum piece that was praised by critics because they were expected to like it. So finally seeing a restored and expanded copy was as much as a revelation as seeing Once Upon a Time in the West letter boxed in how it led me to reevaluate my opinion of the movie. The movie is a strange mixture of political speculation political parable, apocalyptic fantasy, and religious allegory. It depicts a futuristic city that is divided between the wretched workers, who toil in the depths tending the machines, and the upper classes, who dwell in luxury up in the skyscrapers. The hero, the idle, pampered son of the city's supervisor Joh Fredersen, changes his ways and becomes concerned with the plight of the lower classes after catching a glimpse of Maria, the Madonna of the workers. His father, meanwhile, is plotting to thwart Maria with the help of the mad scientist Rotwang, who has discovered how to create robot replicas of human beings. One of the most surprising things about watching this version is just how much I didn't see. In addition to restoring scenes to the film, the DVD also includes inter titles to explain pieces of the plot that cannot be found in any version. With these changes, the story becomes much clearer, particularly the machinations of Rotwang and the master of Metropolis. Perhaps most importantly, a whole new subplot is added involving the hero's dead mother Hel, who was loved by both his father and Rotwang. With this clarification of the back-story, the close but adversarial relationship between Rotwang and Fredersen becomes much clearer. In some ways it recalls the family back-story of the Star Wars movies. Of course, the real strength of Metropolis isn't the story, which is pretty silly and probably wouldn't have worked in anything but a silent film, but its amazing visuals, which in their scale and ambitiousness look forward to 2001 and Blade Runner. Actually, though in most respects silent films now look primitive, one area in which they have the edge over modern film-making is in their frequently grandiose production design. Metropolis employs huge sets to show the hellish factories of the subterranean world. The models of the city's towering skyscrapers are also surprisingly convincing for a 1920s film. Even beyond the expansive production design and (for the time) special effects, Lang's visuals are all consistently inventive. The robot Maria provides some of the movie's most iconic images, including her transformation into a human being. In a later scene, she performs for upper-class men in a nightclub, and as she performs a striptease that in 1920s Germany was apparently seen as very decadent, the screen is filled with wet staring eyeballs. A sign of Lang's visual lavishness, and the studio's, that he doesn't hesitate to throw in lavish dream and hallucination sequences to drive home a point or illustrate a character's state of mind. For instance, when the hero first enters the subterranean city and sees rows upon rows of workers toiling on huge machines, he imagines the furnace transforming into a monstrous idol's head into which the workers are being sacrificed. At another point, while he's sick in bed he imagines statues of the Seven Deadly Sins coming to life and advancing out from a wall in a cathedral. When Maria preaches her message of peace and understanding to the workers, she tells them the story of the Tower of Babel of a management vs. labor parable, and Lang gives us spectacular images of the tower's construction and fall. In a sound film many of these scenes would have seemed redundant and over-literal, but they're what silent cinema does best -tell a story without the advantage- or obstacle- of dialogue. The story is a little slow to start, but once it picks up Metropolis becomes one of the most directly involving silent films that I've seen. In addition to being a pioneering example of the cinematic possibilities of science fiction, Metropolis also has to be one of the earliest disaster films, as the workers riot and sabotage the machines, endangering the entire city. Lang creates a sense of rising fury and nihilism in the last hour that in a strange way reminded me of what was going to happen to Germany in less than 20 years.
Absolutely crammed full of future references to all of your favourite science fiction feature films, series, books, comics and video games. There's also quite a lot rooted in the current world of science non-fiction with the age of automation and robots concurrently being consumed by A.I. and Machine Learning. You could squeeze gene editing in as well if you have the imagination.
I saw a clean restored version and spent a lot of time wishing I was consuming the experience in a cinema as a result. Ambitious, visionary and epic in its making - seldom can any film lay claim to having such huge influence. It must have been quite breathtaking for the paying public of the day, in their time away from the grindstone, to encounter such an alien and yet metaphorically familiar world, as the one they encountered here.
I saw a clean restored version and spent a lot of time wishing I was consuming the experience in a cinema as a result. Ambitious, visionary and epic in its making - seldom can any film lay claim to having such huge influence. It must have been quite breathtaking for the paying public of the day, in their time away from the grindstone, to encounter such an alien and yet metaphorically familiar world, as the one they encountered here.
Fritz Lang's Metropolis is the first true masterpiece of science fiction in film. You can see it's influence in films such as Star Wars, The Matrix, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, Blade Runner, and countless others. Despite the fact that parts of the film are no longer available, the efforts to reconstruct the original film from its remains are valiant enough to provide enough to make the story clear. The special effects were far ahead of their time and the set designs were, in some cases, phenomenal. I can see where some people may not enjoy this movie. It is hard for some to really appreciate a movie that is 77 years old, because a lot has happened in film since then. Yet, if you look at the basic elements of this movie - its story, characters, artwork, cinematography, etc., I believe this movie has just as much to offer now as it must have in the late 1920's. Also, take into consideration the asthetics of German expressionist film when viewing this. The performances and set designs are going to be over the top. That was part of the style. Metropolis may not be for everyone, but, for those willing to read between the lines, this film still has a lot to offer!
Fritz Lang's groundbreaking landmark remains one of the biggest mysteries in the world of cinema. How can a movie that'll soon turn 80 years old still look so disturbingly futuristic?? The screenplay by Thea Von Harbou is still very haunting and courageously assails social issues that are of all ages. The world has been divided into two main categories: thinkers & workers! If you belong to the first category, you can lead a life of luxury above ground but if you're a worker, your life isn't worth a penny, and you're doomed to perilous labor underground. The further expansions and intrigues in the screenplay are too astonishing to spoil, so I strongly advise that you check out the film yourself. It's essential viewing, anyway! "Metropolis" is a very demanding film-experience and definitely not always entertaining. But, as it is often the case with silent-cinema classics, the respect and admiration you'll develop during watching it will widely excel the enjoyment-aspect. Fritz' brutal visual style still looks innovative and few directors since were able to re-create a similarly nightmarish composition of horizontal and vertical lines. Many supposedly 'restored' versions have been released over the years (in 1984 and 2002, for example) but the 1926-version is still the finest in my opinion, even though that one already isn't as detailed and punctual as Lang intended it. "Metropolis" perhaps is THE most important and influential movie ever made. "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Star Wars" and "Blade Runner" owe their existence (or at least their power) to it.
10Bockharn
I doubt that I'd ever seen anything resembling a "complete" version of METROPOLIS before, though certain of its scenes were familiar to me, if only as used and abused in such films as Diane Keaton's HEAVEN (1987). In any case, whatever I had seen before had nothing like the clarity and beauty of the Kino restoration. I expected to be distracted by the restoration's technique of concise written descriptions of missing sequences, but the narrative coherence that these provided was definitely worth it. As "exaggerated" as the style of acting seems by contemporary standards, some performances, such as the Master of the city, are amazingly nuanced and layered, and Brigitte Helm is stunning as both Maria and her evil clone. The meticulous design of the film, the unerring camera placement and Lang's muscular choreography of the crowd scenes are breathtaking. I'd thought of METROPOLIS as a curiosity ("important" = "dull") but now I've come to appreciate it as the seminal work it has always been.
Did you know
- TriviaUnemployment and inflation were so bad in Germany at the time that the producers had no trouble finding 500 children to film the flooding sequences.
- GoofsWhen Freder and Josaphat are climbing down into the miner's city, Freder is barefoot. When they are taking the children up the stairs, he has shoes again.
- Crazy creditsRestoration based on the version in the Filmmuseum Munich and material preserved in the Bundesarchiv-Filmarchiv
- Alternate versionsA version restored by the German Democratic Republic in the eighties runs 115 minutes (still shown on German TV sometimes).
- ConnectionsEdited into Il volo (1975)
Details
Box office
- Budget
- DEM 6,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $1,236,166
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $19,386
- Jul 14, 2002
- Gross worldwide
- $1,351,009
- Runtime2 hours 33 minutes
- Sound mix
- Silent(original release)
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
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