7/28/2019 Urban Renewal: Giorgio Moroder and the Remaking of 'Metropolis'

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fter Lang's Metropolis,there was Clark Kent's.After Clark Kent's, therewas Giorgio Moroder's.

Last summer musician/producerMoroder unveiled a reconstructed versionof Lang's anti-Utopian classic, Metropolis.It was some looker. Moroder's two-and-a-half-year effort had uncovered wholescenes some thought had vanished into theether. Wash-like tints-sepia, blood-red,cool blue-bathed Lang's original black &white tones. New sound effects went be-yond naturalism into impressionism.Smooth-moving subtitles replaced the si-lent movie's intertitles, and contained whatwas said to be a newly authenticated ver-sion of Lang's and scenarist/bride Thea vonHarbou's script. The restoration was noless than a cinematic miracle. "l had thechance to work with Fritz Lang, " saysMoroder today, metaphorically and mod-estly. "l was working with one of the best. "Yet Moroder-the disco/synth-rock im-pressario who launched Donna Summerand who knocked back a couple of Oscarsfor his Midnight Erpress and Flashdancescores-felt he needed something else tomake the restoration saleable: a rockscore. So he wrote or cowrote 10 tunes,mostly with lyricist Pete Bellotte. Itwasn't, however, rock in the sense ofavant-gardists Laurie Anderson, PhilipGlass, orJohn Cale, the likes of which mayhave proven unavailable. It was rock in the

ls'sense of Adam Ant, Pat Benatar, Cycle V,Loverboy, Bill Squier, Bonnie Tyler,Queen's Freddie Mercury, and Yes'JonAnderson. What radio programmers call"Album-Oriented" or "FM" rock. Whatcritics tend to call formulaic pandering tosupposed mass tastes. "If you have ear-plugs," wrote Carrie Rickey inThe BostonHerald, "there's no greater movie experi-ence than seeing the splendidly restoredMetropolis...." Gene Siskel summed it upin the Chicago Tribune: "Nice colors;dumb songs. "Second Time AroundMoroder is again aware of such criticismnow that his masterful restoration is onvideo (out since mid-August). "Therewere things I had to compromise, " he ac-knowledges. "l knew, for example, thatwhen [Francis Ford Coppola's restorationof Abel Gance'sl Napoleon came out-notthe live-orchestra version, but the regularmovie-it flopped terribly. The music wasgood, but it wasn't for the broad audience.If I had to go back and re-do Metropolistoday, " he muses, "l would change a fewsongs, possibly. But if, for example, I hadtaken the songs out, which a lot of peoplehave suggested, then I probably would nothave been able to get the movie released. "As it was, it reached theaters not through amajor studio but through an intrepid inde-pendent called Cinecom. "As long as peo-ple's criticism is toward the film score,that's OK, " says Moroder. "l'm a little hurtif they attack me personally. " Vldeo 85LOUECE

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Lang might've said the same thing. HisOrwellian film of a mechanized future divid-ed into ruling and working classes has al-most always been chastised for its politicalsimplicity, overstated acting, andstereotypical characters. Set in A. D. 2026,the story centers on Freder (GustavFrohlich), son of the malevolent Master ofsuper-city Metropolis. When Freder fallsinlove withMaria (Brigitte Helm), an earthgoddess who organizes and uplifts theworkers, his father engages the Strangelo-vian scientist Rotwang to convert a "fe-male" robot to Maria's likeness. Eventual-ly riots and a near-disaster ensue beforeFreder (the "heart") finally mediates be-tween the rulers (the "head") and theworkers (the "hands").Despite thematic echoes of Germanicmythology and Biblical philosophy, it waspretty thin stuff. Lang himself later dis-avowed the movie. Nevertheless Metropo-/rs is visually stunning. And while that com-bination may sound like a description ofStar Wars, there's no confusing Lucas'special effects with Lang's Expression-ist-based visions. For with Metropolis' sin-ister montages, eye-of-God camera, andrat's-maze overview of the architecture ofhuman existence, Lang melded Teutonicmyths with contemporary Expressionismarguably better than any of his peers inGermany's cinematic golden age.Moroder appreciated that. Still, hehadn't planned on any massive detectivework when he first broached the idea ofrestoring a great silent movie. He'd simplybeen impressed with Coppola's 1981revitalization of Gance's 1927 Napoleon.After a Paramount executive suggestedMoroder do something along those lines,the composer thought it natural to workwith one of his favorite films.

"l first saw Metropolls when I was 17, "he recalls, "and I'd seen it many timessince. While I was looking around for amovie to do, Ihad Metropolrs playing on ascreen one day, and there was music in thebabkground and I thought-this is it. " Af-ter checking out about 20 other silentflicks-and surviving rock-star DavidBowie's own passing fancy inrevivingMe-86 Vldco

tropolis-Moroder paid a German govern-ment foundation $200,000 for the rights toLang's classic.The restoration's final tab would beabout l0 times that. This was somethingelse he hadn't planned. "To be honest, "Moroder says now, "there was a point af-ter a year and a half of work when most ofthe music was done and I thought the mov-ie was ready. But when I presented it tosome of the studio executives, I had goodreactions but nobody wanted to release it.So I decided I had to do some additionalwork-try to find new footage, put newcolor in, have some additional songs. Andthat's when the real interesting part start-ed. "Suburbon Sprowl

The "interesting part" hinged on the factthat the ostensibly authentic versions ofMetropolis playing the college and art-house circuit really aren't. As Moroder dis-covered while speaking with German si-lent-film expert Enno Patalas of the FilnrMuseum in Munich, Metropolis exists inseveral'versions. Most had long ago beentruncated for every reason from censor-ship to fitting in enough showings per day.Moroder finally decided-both for a com-mercial hook and given his own creativeurges-that he wanted nothing less than tocreate the compleat Metropolis.This meant globe-hopping, both in per-son and by phone. One of the first stopswas the Australian Library of Film in Can-berra. There, Patalas had told him, wereeight "lost" scenes bequeathed through afilm-collector's will. These included one ofthe reconstruction's most evocative im-ages, that of Olympian-style games set in averitable Colosseum. Moroder also foundscenes of a decadent ruling-class plea-sure-palace where the ersatz Maria per-forms a dizzyingly erotic strip-dance."l was calling all over the world to findfootage, " Moroder remembers. "One timewe even tracked down some guy on a boatout of India, but he wasn't who we thoughthe was. " The search took Moroder to LosAngeles, where film collector John Hamp-ton supplied a small but choice amount of

ang's' Metropolis,' utaMoroder. The restoration wasno less than a cinemotic mira-cle, restoring lost scenes, add-ing intpressionist sounde.f.fects, wosh-like tints, ond-unlbrtunate ly-dumb songs.new/old footage-from a deteriorating,highly flammable "nitrate" (pre-1950 filmstock). Then Moroder traced the originalscript and a hand-notated original score tothe German Censorship Ministry in Berlin.Using that source material, the multilingualMoroder retranslated the script. (Mostversions in the U.S. carry a Museum ofModern Art translation Moroder terms "adisaster. ") While working with the script,Moroder uncovered some shiny filmic nug-gets.The most impressive was the rediscov-ery of a pivotal character named Hel whoman American censor had excised years be-fore because the name was "improper. "Hel was Freder's dead mother and thelong-ago subject of Rotwang's affection;the very reason, in fact, that the scientisthad created a "female" robot. Moroder,however, couldn't find any pictures of Hel.A still of her tombstone turned up at theCinematheque in Paris, but it wasunusable-prompting Moroder to recon-struct the monument and re-film it. Mean-while, Fritz Lang's former agent, ForestAckerman, found a few stills in his ownfiles-stills which close a plot hole con-cerning a worker with whom F'rederchanges places. Moroder, using a tech-nique pioneered by the restorers of theGarland/Mason A Star is Born, filmed thestills using camera movement to simulatemotion.Finally Moroder heard about a collectorin San Diego. "This was toward the end ofmy work. I didn't discover anything newthere except that the San Diego copy hadsubtitles instead of intertitles. I thoughtthat was so much better that even thoughI'd already done the (retranslated) titlecards, I decided to go back and put in sub-titles. "Wotch Your SpeedA few more aesthetic decisions had to bemade. The most important, perhaps, con-cerned the film speed. Unversed audi-ences aren't aware of it, but silent moviesaren't supposed to look sped-up. They onlylook that way because they were filmed at

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Morodercontinued front page 86

anywhere from 16 to 20 frames per sec-ond, and we project films today at a stan-dard24 frames per second. Film museumsgenerally have variable-speed projectors,and try to run silent films at the properspeed. Some video companies, too, mostnotably Video Yesteryear, likewise try toslow down silent films for video releases.In the case of. Metropolis, says Moroder,"l asked a lot of filmmakers about the pos-sibility of slowing it down. It turned out notto be possible. First of all, commercialcinemas don't have the proper projectors,as museums do. And if we'd cut, say, oneframe out of every two, you get a jerkingmotion, which is not good at all. The onlyway would have been to transfer it ontovideo (at the proper speed), and then takeit back. But then you'd lose so much qualityit would have been terrible. " How about forVestron's video release? "That would havemeant redoing all the music, whichwouldn't have been in sync anymore. " Forthat reason and because of the subtitlessaving time, the 87-minute restored ver-sion is shorter than some others.In any case, Moroder has given us amasterpiece. No one could seriously ac-cuse him of "ruining" Metropolis-all theother versions will exist as long as thereare VCRs, museums, or film buffs. As forMoroder's and his collaborators' songs, ifyou don't like them, just turn down thevolume or dub in your own songs. That'svideo."The only thing any creator can do, "avows the composer, "is to do somethingthe way you think is right. If it turns out tobe right, great. If not, then obviously Imade some mistakes. " But did you do rightby Fritz Lang, one of filmdom's greatestlights? Yes, Giorgio! Ul