The previous entry reminds me of an item I meant to post some time ago but let slide, another story about a cinematic treasure turning up in an unexpected place. This time, it’s a complete print of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, which has not seen in its long-form version for 80 years.

Metropolis, if you don’t know, is one of the great classics of the silent era as well as a seminal work in the science fiction genre. It is arguably the first true science-fiction film, at least as we now generally understand the term, a futuristic tale about a cruel, dystopian society rigidly segregated into economic classes and the inevitable rebellion of the underclass. It’s an eye-popping movie, even by modern standards, and its influence can seen in everything from Chaplin’s Modern Times to the original Star Wars (Ralph McQuarrie’s original concept for Threepio is a dead-ringer for the Robotrix in the photo above) to Blade Runner and the Star Wars prequels (the Metropolis skyline suggests both Ridley Scott’s Los Angeles of 2019 and Lucas’ Coruscant).

The story of what happened to Metropolis is not an uncommon one for silent and early sound movies, many of which have lost reels over the decades or gone missing altogether. The short version is that Lang’s original three-and-a-half hour version was drastically cut down before it went into wide release, and the excised footage faded into the mists of history, becoming nothing more than a cinematic legend whispered about by film buffs in the revival houses and home theaters but generally believed to be gone forever. The most comprehensive version of the movie currently available to the public is missing roughly 90 minutes compared to Lang’s original. However, a complete print of the full-length version was located earlier this year in Buenos Aires. It seems a private collector brought the print to Argentina in 1928. Last I heard, this print was being evaluated to see what condition it’s in and whether it’s worth trying to restore for a DVD release.

I hope it is. Film, unlike so many other art forms, is so ephemeral… film stocks deteriorate with age and use, and foolish business decisions or simple accidents can destroy entire archives worth of material. I’ve read that something like 90 percent of the movies made during the silent era are just… gone… lost forever to nitrate decomposition, fires, or even deliberate destruction (i.e., some suit somewhere ordering the prints to be chucked in the trash because it’s no longer economical to store them). Many of these films are probably not worth the saving, true, but you never know what we’ve lost, and you never know what might matter to someone, somewhere. I’m a preservationist by nature, if you haven’t guessed by now, and I think every single one of these losses is a tragedy. My ultimate fantasy is that some philanthropist somewhere will one day fund an effort to digitally preserve everything, all the old movies and television programs that are still in existence, and archive them somewhere for the public to continue enjoying for as long as anyone’s interested. I like to think that someday, centuries from now, people could still be enjoying The Little Rascals, or the Thin Man movies, or the original Star Trek, or… well, you get my point.

In any event, a longer article about the discovery of the Metropolis print is here; it’s from a German publication, and some of the language is a little odd, probably due to being translated. Still, it’s worth a read if you like real-life mysteries and treasure-hunts.

As I said earlier, it amazes me to think of what might be hidden away out there in some dusty cupboard or forgotten back room…