While we wait for our regular pianist Lillian Henley to return from her summer break, we’re delighted to be showing the restored full cut of Fritz Lang’s iconic 1926 silent classic Metropolis with a pre-recorded symphonic score.
Set in a future city where the lucky inhabitants of gilded society reside comfortably high above the unlucky masses slaving underground, we follow the city leader’s son on an odyssey to the depths in pursuit of Maria, a teacher he met briefly on her visit to the city above. Meanwhile, her evil robot doppelgänger is set loose on a mission to corrupt and destroy the city.
Based on Thea von Harbou’s novel of the same name, director Fritz Lang also claimed to have been inspired by his first glimpse of the New York skyline. Their expressionist, dystopian vision, realised in collaboration with the groundbreaking work of their German Expressionist production designers and cinematographers, results in one of the very greatest and grandest films of the silent era and a prediction of the where modernity and machines might lead.
It is one of the first science fiction feature films, arguably the most influential of all. Countless filmmakers have been inspired by the film’s audacious futuristic imagery, from Frankenstein (1931) to Blade Runner (1982), while the film’s iconic ‘Maria’ robot has inspired numerous performers and designers, from Beyoncé to Thierry Mugler.
We are delighted to present Metropolis at the Palace accompanied by the recording by the Berlin Symphony Orchestra of Gottfried Huppertz’s original score. We look forward to welcoming back the Palace’s regular piano accompanist Lillian Henley later this year.
Director: Fritz Lang
Starring: Brigitte Helm, Alfred Abel & Gustav Fröhlich
Year: 1927
Language: Silent with English intertitles & pre-recorded score
Country: Germany
Running time: 2hrs 33mins