Metropolis: Review By slysnide

Fritz Lang & Thea von Harbou wrote the screenplay in 1924 for a 1926 publication date in novelized form. The following year, Fritz Lang released a film he directed based on it which was produced by Erich Pommer.

The plot follows a common scifi theme about social crisis between the lower working class & upper thinking class; In which the workers slave away at keeping the thinker's utopia afloat, when they themselves haven't the foresight to resolve the system; While the thinkers don't know how anything they think of works, thus increasing dependency on the working class every time a new thought is brought to the worker's attention. The world they live in is of course a dystopia by the book (no pun intended), while neither group sees it that way, as the thinkers are the beneficiaries in the dystopia, while the workers haven't the foresight to identify the problem.

It sounds like a fascinating film no? Well, the first mistake it made was having no screen time dedicated to showing how the thinkers lived. In fact they weren't shown at all. Only the Lord of Metropolis Joh Fredersen (Alfred Abel), his son Freder (Gustav Frohlich), and C.A. Rotwang (Rudolf Klein-Rogge) were featured. The first two of course being atop the pedestal of this dystopia, while Rotwang is sort of in the middle as he lives in an old barn at the center of Metropolis and serves Lord Joh's will. Instead, the conflicts between the two classes was conveyed by the fantastic cityscape of the thinker's division of Metropolis, and the whole desolate world of the worker's world beneath Metropolis. Given the disparity of the worker's conditions, then the film didn't really require any screen time dedicated to the thinkers, but excluding them entirely when they are as just as important to the plot as the workers is ridiculous.

Underground in the worker's world, they are obscured by the industrial zones of Metropolis which lie amongst their homes (the latter are also not shown). The workers slave away at running dangerous machines which keep the utopian thinker's world afloat...figuratively speaking. So while I am a fan of such plots for their depth and scope, many have done it better than this film. Though because this did it first, then that's the only reason why I can fathom how it's considered a classic on so many levels.

Freder is the next problem in that he is just like Gustav von Wangenheim who played Harker in "Nosferatu" (1922) in that he's unrealistically and improperly happy and oblivious to his surroundings as the entire disparity of the worker's world comes as a surprise to him. For after seeing Maria (Brigitte Helm) for the first time, he follows her to the caverns of the industrial worker's world where an explosion occurs as a result of lucrative working conditions. Maria is the leader of the worker's for reform, and so learning this, Freder returns to his father oblivious as ever asking why the worker's life is so disarrayed & dangerous when they keep Metropolis' machines working, thus allowing Metropolis to stay afloat. He insists that Maria's ways be heeded, yet the bizarre Joh whom is the architect of this dystopia looks more remorseful for the workers despite that it is he who's created the hell they live in. Very odd on behalf of actor Alfred Abel. As for Freder, I'd swear he was a mime given how bright white his face is, though he also sports gullibility and immediately buys into Maria's struggle without ever suffering through it himself. Because the plot jumps right into the requirement to revolt, and you never get to see the suffering of the workers nor the life of the thinkers, then all the compassion there could've been is consp*cuously absent. As is the visual aspect of the dystopia, which is rather just assumed through narration dialogue cards at the beginning of the film. Thus making the hour long revolt to the finish rather lackluster given the 117 minute runtime of the film.

Of course Joh tries to change things in his favor and in so doing he acquires a golden robot designed by Rotwang to bring the worker's revolt to an immediate halt through violence. This robot looks like the female version of C-3PO, and was the basis for him by artist Ralph McQuarrie in the seventies. This robot begins doing as Joh commands it to do, though the look of the robot itself is greatly underused in the film, appearing nearly an hour in for maybe less than ten minutes before it's given a makeover to look exactly like Maria to complete the deception. Though the few images of the golden robotrix in this B&W flick is one of the most iconic, attractive, and repulsive images in silent film history.

The music was opera themed like "The Phantom of the Opera" (1925), but it wasn't as good as it didn't really seem to escalate in intensity towards the harrowing climax; the resolution of which made no sense as no time was spent to justify the sudden end to the revolt & subsequently the film itself.

Remarkably however, on July 1st 2008, Berlin film experts revealed that a 16mm copy of the original 210 minute undebuted version of the film was discovered in a Buenos Aires Argentina film museum archive. Unlike other films whose extended versions have been promised restoration for years now like the 220 minute print of "It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World" (1963) which has seen no progress in 7yrs, this version promises to be completely restored in early 2010 with missing plot & subplot elements that'll fill in the blanks to the story, as well as make it make more sense. This version is very real, and is eagerly anticipated by fans of the movie, of which I like the ideas presented in it, but not the film itself.

So overall, given the gross aforementioned errors, I didn't care for the film, but am looking forward to seeing this 210 minute version. And oddly enough, the remake rights have been recently granted to Thomas Schuely sometime in 2007, so I eagerly await that film as well if it comes to fruitition. In the meantime, many will like & dislike this film, but the universal and undying theme was first presented on celluloid here, allowing "Metropolis" to secure its rightful place in the annals of film history.