“Metropolis” doesn’t really resolve anything. At its conclusion, the worker village underneath the Earth has been destroyed, the luxurious Garden of Eden is abandoned and the majestic city to represent all cities has been brought to a stand still.
The people of “Metropolis” have only reestablished human morality for the moment. Man is equal once more, but there is no sense things are about to change.
Fritz Lang used the most money ever spent on a German film to make an epic about mankind’s scary dependence on technology, the massive rift between social classes and the rapid decline of humanity when posed with our own ego, sin and anger. This civilization can only thrive with the gifts of modern engineering. What’s more, the wealth inequality will remain intact and sin has not been eradicated. The story ends happily, but you can see how Lang would leave the eventual fate of the world somewhat tentative.
“Metropolis” was butchered and never to be seen appropriately due to its length, its poor box office appeal, its religious overtones and its confusing imagery for American audiences, but one gets the idea that some of the themes Lang was engaging here were just a bit too much for some people to handle.
It’s an impossible gift then that Lang’s film still exists at all, and now with additional footage such that Lang’s vision can be fully understood. It’s a pivotal film because of its scale and its visionary glimpse of the future, but it’s been so captivating through the years because it capitalizes on so many fears, all of which are universal. Continue reading “Metropolis (1927)”