The Complete Metropolis
The most influential of all silent films — and a blueprint for future classics like Blade Runner and The Matrix — Fritz Lang’s visionary Metropolis can finally be seen as intended, with 25 minutes of newly—discovered footage and Gottfried Huppertz’s magnificent original score.
The addition of this astounding new material (1,257 shots, including entire new sequences), carefully restored and edited into the 2002 restoration, results in the closest rendition ever seen since the film’s 1927 Berlin premiere. For details, go to kino.com/metropolis.
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Metropolis - 1927
A visionary and elaborate spectacle by director Fritz Lang is an epic projection of a futuristic city divided into a working and an elite class.
Its exhilarating climax brings the city to its knees, as the classes clash against each other. In the 21st century, a de-humanized proletariat labors non-stop in a miserable subterranean city beneath a luxurious city of mile-high skyscrapers, flying automobiles, palatial architectural idylls, tubes and tunnels.
With stunningly inventive special effects, Lang's allegorical narrative and architectural vision creates a highly stylized vision of a not so unlikely future (especially for 1926 when the film was made).
As the elite frolic above the clouds, thousands of miserable workers toil night and day inside the belly of the gigantic machine that runs the entire city. Metropolis is controlled by a sinister authoritarian whose son, Freder, rejects his father's callous philosophy and attitude towards laborers.philosophy and attitude towards laborers.
Meek though they are, the workers are encouraged by Maria, a wistful young woman who wills her comrades to embrace patience and silent strength. Upon discovering her influence upon the workers, a mad scientist kidnaps Maria and creates a robot in her image that will incite the workers to revolt. As Freder races against time to save Maria and curtail the damage done by her doppelganger robot, Metropolis is enveloped in chaos and the classes are brought together in a breathtaking and highly moralistic climax.
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