Metropolis (motion picture)

Metropolis (motion picture), early science-fiction motion picture directed by Fritz Lang. Released in 1927, this German silent film depicts a future in which the workers are kept completely separate from society’s elite class. After the ruler’s son Freder (Gustav Fröhlich) learns that all the workers live in terrible conditions underground, he falls in love with a revolutionary worker (Brigitte Helm). When a robot incites the workers to revolt, the city’s ruler destroys much of the workers’ underground city by flooding it with water. The film is notable for its striking images of the future, which seem to be an outgrowth of the German Expressionist art movement of that era.

Director

• Fritz Lang

Cast

• Alfred Abel (Joh Fredersen)
• Gustav Fröhlich (Freder)
• Rudolf Klein-Rogge (Rotwang)
• Brigitte Helm (Maria, Robot)
• Fritz Rasp (Slim)
• Theodor Loos (Josaphat, Joseph)
• Erwin Biswanger (Georg, No. 11811)
• Heinrich George (Grot, the foreman)
• Olaf Storm (Jan)
• Hans Leo Reich (Marinus)
• Heinrich Gotho (Master of ceremonies)
• Margarete Lanner (Woman in car, Woman in eternal garden)
• Max Dietze (Worker)
• Georg John (Worker)
• Walter Kuhle (Worker)
• Arthur Reinhard (Worker)
• Erwin Vater (Worker)
• Grete Berger (Female worker)
• Olly Boheim (Female worker)
• Ellen Frey (Female worker)
• Lisa Gray (Female worker)
• Rose Lichtenstein (Female worker)
• Helene Weigel (Female worker)
• Beatrice Garga (Women in eternal garden)
• Anny Hintze (Women in eternal garden)
• Helen von Munchhofen (Women in eternal garden)
• Hilde Woitscheff (Women in eternal garden)
• Fritz Alberti (Robot)

Quotes

• Freder: “It was their hands that built this city of ours, Father. But where do the hands belong in your scheme?”
• Joh Frederson: “In their proper place, the depths.”