Hey folks, Harry here ... When Rotwang sent this in, it kind of made me laugh as I had just been exchanging email with Peter Jackson about Maria from METROPOLIS and had just sent Peter the following image:
That's an old Postcard that Forry sent me, but I have to say - Fandom's interest in this print of METROPOLIS really does my heart good. Because this is a real big deal. I love this film, when I was on the AEON FLUX set - which was housed in the same building in which METROPOLIS was shot... It boggled my mind. During the lunch break, I stayed on set... which was completely empty and just stared up into exquisite wooden rafters and let my mind dream of what was seen from above. Dreaming of the missing footage and hoping that I would live to see it. And here we are. Now, if we can just find LONDON AFTER MIDNIGHT...
Hey, Harry - I don't know if you're looking for any more reports on the restored Metropolis, but I was lucky enough to see it last night in the Castro Theatre presentation. I'm a longtime fan of the film and have seen everything from the Murnau restoration to a crappy VHS copy from the 1980s that was white screen with a few faded shadows in most places. Oh, and of course the Moroder version, for all its flaws. I don't know if you've seen this yet, but here are some details that can only come from a theater seat... The presentation is magnificent, everything a movie of this scale and importance should be. Since it uses the Murnau restoration as the base, 3/4 of the film is clear and sharp and outstanding. The material taken from the Buenos Aires film was both in very poor condition and slightly reduced in frame by the 16mm transfer, so those inserts are both very grainy (vertically streaked, a bit Star Trek-y somehow) and surrounded by a black border of maybe 1/20th the frame size. It's very watchable, even if some parts are as blurry as an old B&W TV. Some inserts are just a frame or two, some are a few seconds long, and a few seem to be several minutes long. Most are perhaps ten seconds. It's a huge thrill to see these additions pop into well-known sequences. As much as I'd like to see them as clear and wonderful as the Murnau material, it's great to be able to know it's new material and be able to adjust your thinking on the fly. I am not certain how much the previously existing material has been rearranged (re-rearranged?) around the new inserts, but I had the sense that some familiar shots and scenes were far out of place from where I was used to them. In any case, this is the first time, ever, in at least a dozen full viewings of good versions, that the sweep and flow of the story was uninterrupted and needed no help from my underlying knowledge of the story and characters. It simply flowed across the screen, smooth and powerful and magnificent, and I could watch it like any other film, not needing to keep referring to a mental script to try and make sense of things. There are only two missing sequences now, the monk preaching to Freder about the whore of Babylon (which is repeated, with the Thin Man in the monk's place, later, and gives you an idea of what the missing footage looks like), and the fight between Joh Fredersen and Rotwang (of which a few tag ends remain as well). Neither interruption ruins the flow of the film at all. I simply can't wait for my Blu-Ray copy this Christmas... and I have worn out my attempts to thank my wife, who took my long-lead request for the disc and surprised me with tickets to this showing within striking distance of home, and gave me an evening of overpowering magnificence not even the biggest plasma can deliver - seeing this on a big screen, with 3000 people and a live orchestra was... overwhelming. Everything about this event will stick in my mind for a long, long time. Oh, the score: performed live by the Alloy Orchestra and simply fantastic. I was unsure how an avant-garde "junk" orchestra would handle this, but from the opening notes on (I think) a musical saw to the thunderous junk-pounding that accompanied the final 20 minutes of the film, it was an equal partner to what was on the screen. At the conclusion, the audience was told that the Alloy score was selected by Kino as an alternate (to the original score performed by a large orchestra) on the forthcoming disc. The roar practically blew the gilt off the Castro's interior decorations, and I was delighted I would get to hear it again. You know the scene at the end of Dark City, when John takes on the most powerful of the Visitors? That thunderous, overwhelming score? That's like what Alloy does - but it goes on and on for the entire end of the film, from the time the false Maria is exhorting the workers to riot until Rotwang falls to his death. Insanely powerful stuff for twenty, twenty-five minutes and you're left limp and exhausted for the final scene. I don't usually say things like this, but I am overwhelmingly glad to have lived long enough to see this restoration found, completed and presented. It's nothing less than one of humanity's greatest treasures and I'm richer for having finally seen it. If this is of any use, sign me C.A. Rotwang.
