Since a big chunk of the story is still missing, mainly sub-plots and connective tissue, but also key scenes (like the fight between Rotwang and Fredersen), one has to read the intertitles correctly to get the big picture. The Filmmuseum has added new titles explaining the missing material, in a different typeface to make this easier.

There are also titles that cues the music movements - Intermezzo, things like that. Either the restorers went way overboard being literal about the cue titles listed in the score and the censor records, or Metropolis was conceived as a symphony of several movements, like Murnau's Sunrise.

It might be helpful to watch a few minutes of a previous copy, even the Giorgio Moroder version, to better appreciate the digital restoration done by Alpha-Omega of Munich. The image now has a proper grey-on-grey patina, instead of the harsh contrast of earlier prints. It's almost completely steady, instead of chattering, shifting, and warping in the gate as it always did before.

In 1983, Giorgio Moroder added lots of color tints to the movie, in addition to his own funky opticals and other futzing around. It is my understanding that in 1927 the film was originally released all in b&w, as we see it here.

The new material consists of longer versions of scenes, with better continuity (although some jump-cuts are still in evidence) and connecting tissue. As I stated before, the scene with Freder having a bad dream in his rooms, while the False Maria dances for the rich sons of the city, is vastly improved. It now has a smoother opening, that establishes the spy Slim (Fritz Rasp) at the foot of Freder's bed. When Maria dances, Freder has a dream of Revelations, and Slim seems to transform into the monk in the cathedral who talks about the coming of the antichrist. Through titles explaining missing material, and some now-restored montage shots, Freder, the False Maria, Slim, and the Seven Deadly Sins in the cathedral are now all linked - Death's scythe is an omen of doom for the city, and the False Maria's throne is now borne by the 'freed' Deadly Sins. The scene fuses Freder's delusions with biblical prophecy, eroticism, and visual poetry. It's uniquely cinematic, in that its impact could not be duplicated in print or on a theatrical stage.

The cleaned-up, re-beautified image also lets one appreciate the superlative design of Metropolis that was impossible in the inferior earlier prints. Metropolis has complete control of the illusion of scale. As in King Kong, when things are supposed to be big, they Look Big. This won't be as apparent on a monitor as it was on a screen, where the towering canyons of the city indeed appeared to be colossal. Simple sculptural details, such as the design of the Maschine Man robot, are better appreciated here as well. The same goes for the new montage elements, and the bizarre multi-image shots where dozens of eyes watch the False Maria spread her message of destruction.

Kino Video's DVD of Metropolis is a fine presentation in almost every respect. The bit rate and compression is always adequate, although complex scenes show a bit of additional grain on a large monitor. The film has been slightly windowboxed, which is a very good idea. This version has already come out in Region 2, and this Region 1 release retains all of the extras, translated through subtitles into English, French and Spanish. There are 13 cast and crew text biographies, and several photo, still, design, and poster artwork galleries. The original posters pictured are even annotated with the names of their original artists.

The two featurettes are phenomenal. In 'The Digital Restoration', Martin Koerber explains the methods used by Alpha-Omega to optimize and repair the film material we see. The narration is very frank and forthright about the problems of using automatic dirt removal software. We see a demonstration where fast-moving objects, like character legs and parts of faces, are erased along with the dirt. The key to such digital tools is to use them sparingly, and concentrate on the manual removal of flaws by trained artists ... which is how thousands of bits of speckling and dirt were removed from even the best film material they had. All of this is backed up with visual clips from Alpha-Omega. For one decomposed composite effect, the restorers apparently had access to the original optical elements, and recomposited them digitally to match the original effects work. Koerber shows us the entire process.

The longer making-of docu by Enno Patalas is even better, starting with The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and explaining the German studio and political contexts before, during and after the making of the movie. Patalas ends on a very interesting note, explaining the incongruities (poetic contrasts?) in the film that he thinks contributed to its lack of success on its 1927 release. As he explains, nobody then would have guessed that Metropolis would become one of, if not the, most heralded silent film ever made.

The score, in 5.1 Surround, is very impressive, with some good themes and some fairly limp ones. I've read much more astute musical criticism of Gottfried Huppertz's work than I can offer. It certainly presents motifs that follow the basic drift of the story, but it makes little effort to 'ride' the emotional content of each scene, even to the extent that good silent-movie organists will 'play' the mood of the films they accompany. It's timed out well, right down to orchestrating aural blasts to complement the shift-change sirens on the rooftops of the city. But during the catacomb church scene, for instance, almost nothing at all happens to mark or underline Maria's entrance, or the two lovers coming together. I guess movie score 'Mickey Mousing' happened later with composers like Max Steiner.

Huppertz veers toward kitsch when his 'revolt' theme quotes 'La Marseillaise'. But his music consistently augments and amplifies the rhythms that Fritz Lang built into the film, such as the ringing of the giant bell in the Workers' city. That was the main failing of Moroder's dynamic disco score - it too often ignored the rhythms of the movie running beneath it.

This brings Savant to the issue that got him into hot water earlier with Kino. When Enno Patalas and his restorers toured the world with their digital print, they opted to screen it at 20 frames per second. I assume they determined this was the proper speed, otherwise why would they make the various screening venues go to all the trouble of changing over to varispeed motors, making sure the arclights wouldn't burn the film at the slower speed, etc.?

When Kino decided to release the film theatrically at 24 frames per second, it was the only practical thing to do. Having a theater change its aspect ratio is often too much to ask for, and most modern equipment is meant to run at 24 fps and nothing else. So it is of course reasonable to expect a wide release of the picture to be at the standard speed.

Kino opted to carry through with their theatrical speed for the DVD release, and here is where Savant has differences. Metropolis is grand at any speed, but when one speeds it up so radically to 24 fps, it becomes another film experience altogether. The rhythms are faster. When they jolt jerkily with each step, the marching workers no longer look weary, shifting forward as if in a funeral procession. All of the fast action is now in a hyper-fast, Keystone Kops mode. In some shots that were originally undercranked to make the action faster than normal, the characters now zip about like fireflies.

Why would UFA premiere Metropolis at this fast speed? I believe it was because they were desperate. With financial ruin closing in, they reacted the same way modern studios do, by hedging their bets. They probably felt they had a control problem with Fritz Lang, who had delivered yet another 3 & 1/2 hour behemoth instead of the efficient moneymaker they needed - the days of two-part, four hour monstrosities like Mabuse and Die Nibelungen were over. Not to mention the liklihood that 1927 audiences wouldn't understand or appreciate Lang's avant-garde artistic abstractions. Most audiences still don't.

The relative speed-up from 20 to 24 fps is best understood in the difference in running times. In the Museum screening, the film ran 147 minutes. At sound speed, the same film lasts only 123 minutes. This isn't the slight edge you see on TV Land, with time compression running a 24 fps Leave it to Beaver at 25 fps or so. This is faster.

It's true, when Savant heard about the speed decision for DVD, he squealed like a stuck pig, and acted indignant in a way that got a lot of attention I didn't need. The web is already overflowing with Whining Weenies complaining about trivial problems in DVDs. Kino didn't need the backtalk either, and made some attempts to show me the error of my thinking. I was given the reasoning that replicating the premiere speed was authorized, authentic and historically accurate, and was chided for pre-judging a film I hadn't seen. But I had seen Metropolis at 24fps many times and knew exactly how it would play. And that's how it does play in the Kino presentations. The False Maria's erotic dance, a show-stopper in the Museum, now looks like a Betty Boop cartoon. When UFA sped the film up for their 1927 premiere, Lang must have been crushed to see his good work so severely altered.

I did not read a single published review of the Kino theatrical release that complained about, or even mentioned, this speed difference that so concerns me. Did none of them see the earlier Museum run? The lack of concern is good ammunition for Kino to label me an errant nut (too late, that happened a lo-ong time ago), and dismiss my protests. But that doesn't change the facts - Audiences who tittered and laughed at the accelerated action of earlier versions, still chuckled in the theatrical run of this version. I had the opportunity to ask Mr. Patalas if he felt the 24 fps speed was 'correct', and his return email simply quoted Kino's 'authentic premiere speed' party line. Then why, when he toured his restoration around the world before Kino was involved, did he go to all the trouble to have it shown at the slower speed?

But one last jab ... Metropolis expert Aitam Bar-Sagi reported that before the Kino deal, a European cable television outlet screened the film in a video version at the correct speed - with an inferior soundtrack, I understand, but at the correct speed. Hopefully that version, or something like it (C'mon, Kino, how about a followup disc?), perhaps with a choice of original scores, would fully restore Fritz Lang's masterpiece to the closest approximation of its original lustre.

On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor, Metropolis rates:
Movie: Excellent, if Too Darn Fast to please spoiled Savants
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent
Supplements: Commentary by film historian Enno Patalas, Commentary subtitles in English, French, and Spanish, 5.1 surround sound of newly recorded orchestral score, "The Metropolis Case": a 43-minute documentary by Enno Patalas (with English, French, and Spanish subtitles), Restoration featurette (with English, French, and Spanish subtitles), Photo galleries featuring production stills, missing scenes, architectural sketches, and poster artwork, 13 cast and crew biographies, Facts and dates
Packaging: Keep case
Reviewed: January 22, 2003