# Fritz Lang's Masterpiece "Metropolis" to be Remade **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 19, 2007, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561 "2007-12-19T11:12:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/41 "2007-12-21T01:26:33Z")
[QUOTE=Kuboydal] Wow, that’s a parade of arrogance worthy of the pit. [/QUOTE] The truth is arrogant. Tough. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/42 "2007-12-21T01:52:50Z")
I saw _Metropolis_ at an art house movie theater accompanied by an old Wurlitzer Pipe Organ. Very cool. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/43 "2007-12-21T05:02:14Z")
I honestly can’t imagine why anyone would think they would like to remake “Metropolis”. What’s the point? Why would anyone think the name “Metropolis” would help sell the movie? I can’t see how anyone who had any appreciation of the original movie would think that anything even remotely resembling the original would have anything to say that the original wouldn’t say better. And anyone who didn’t care and just wanted to cash in, well, it’s not like Metropolis is exactly a franchise ready blockbuster. Sure, they could make an action movie with lots of explosions and a female robot, but why bother naming the movie “Metropolis” then? It’s not like anyone outside of film buffs have ever heard of Metropolis, and the people who have heard of the original won’t be interested anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/44 "2007-12-21T06:07:43Z")
[QUOTE=xnylder] It’s been done, it was strange: [Metropolis the anime movie](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolis_(2001_film)) [/QUOTE] The Metropolis anime wasn’t too bad. I saw it the weekend before A.I. was released in Tokyo and of the two, Metropolis was much better. Sticking to Tezuka’s rather dated 40’s art style for the characters with lush 3D backgrounds was rather wonky and was hard to get over to take the movie seriously, but the ending scene with I Can’t Stop Loving You playing won me over. I read the original manga and it has almost nothing to do with the movie beyond the look of the key characters. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/45 "2007-12-21T06:26:23Z")
[QUOTE=BMalion] I wanted my answer to look like a silent movie title card. [/QUOTE] Then shouldn’t it have been: \* \*\* ~~NO!~~ \*\* \* ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/46 "2007-12-21T07:12:59Z")
I’ve seen the original several times, both the Moroder version, with live accompaniment, and the recently reconstructed version. It’s a masterpiece. The original is iconic, the designs are so abstract it’s almost like a coloring book inviting me to fill in the details of how that world works and what parts of it we don’t see. And I remember it more as a series of scenes than the story as a whole. There’s the ruling class and the children of privilege, the workers who are slaves to the machines instead of the other way around, a female android to impersonate and undermine the inspirational Maria; I think someone with vision and talent could make some stunning sequences from those themes. But that still leaves two things that I can’t see a way for a remake to handle well. The whole bit at the end where the hands and the brain decide to work together, with the heart to guide them, would be laughed out of the theater these days. It needs a more fulfilling climax. The other problem is all the rest of the story. The original is amazing to look at, and must have been even moreso in 1927. I didn’t watch it for the story. But I don’t know if you can lure audiences in just with great pictures anymore. I saw _Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow_, and it’s gorgeous to look at, but there wasn’t anything more to it, and it flopped. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/47 "2007-12-21T12:27:32Z")
[QUOTE=Fear Itself] Then shouldn’t it have been: \* \*\* ~~NO!~~ \*\* \* [/QUOTE] Well done sir! ---
**Author:** ![Skylark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Skylark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skylark)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/48 "2007-12-21T18:38:03Z")
I really hope they get Queen to do the soundtrack on this one. Or maybe The Darkness; I can imagine Freder in front of the giant machine rocking out with the proles to “I Believe in a Thing Called Love” to woo Maria’s heart (played by Kirsten Dunst). [QUOTE=Tuckerfan] From what I understand [this](http://www.amazon.com/Metropolis-Restored-Authorized-Alfred-Abel/dp/B00007L4MJ/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1198145167&sr=1-1) is as close as we’ll ever get to Fritz Lang’s original vision. [/QUOTE] I have that copy (or, did, until a friend ‘borrowed’ it), and it is a good quality edition. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/49 "2007-12-21T18:49:44Z")
[QUOTE=BMalion] I have it on good authority that the robot will be played by a CGI naked Angelina Jolie. [/QUOTE] I’m there. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2007, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561/50 "2007-12-21T19:55:15Z")
[QUOTE=BMalion] I have it on good authority that the robot will be played by a CGI naked Angelina Jolie. [/QUOTE] Or they’ll borrow[the costume](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Cyberwoman.jpg) from BBC Wales! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fritz-langs-masterpiece-metropolis-to-be-remade/430561.md?page=2)