Metropolis Essay Questions

What famous story is used in order to open the eyes of the workers in the city?

Maria holds a meeting with the workers in the catacombs of the city. Here she tells them the story of the Tower of Babel, and how a great city was being built in order to exalt human innovation. In the story, the city was destroyed because the people only sought to glorify themselves, and because there were huge inequalities within that society. She draws a parallel between this biblical cautionary tale and their own Metropolis. By referencing this ancient story, she is able to illuminate the unequal conditions under which the workers live in the city.

What does the epigraph of the film mean?

The workers represent the hands, while Joh Fredersen represents the mind. Lang tells us, through Maria's character, that the mind and the hands cannot connect without the heart. This is where Freder comes in, as he represents the heart, able to connect his father, the ruler, to the people who are building his great vision. Harmony can only be achieved through this connective relationship.

What is the name of the place Freder is found and what does it represent?

Freder is first seen in The Pleasure Garden. The symbolism of him being here is that he is afforded the pleasure of doing anything he likes because his father has created an empire, and like a prince, Freder does not have to face the hardships of life or the burden of work in the same way as the workers do. The Garden, and Freder in it, shows us that he is a man who has inherited freedom, but didn't earn it. Thus, his journey becomes more compelling when he decides to leave this luxury to fight for the freedom of the working class.

How was the film innovative at the time of its release?

Metropolis is touted by many as being the first ever science fiction film. Indeed, it pioneered many of the tropes—dystopian futures, political allegory, large-scale tableaus and special effects—that have become so canonized in the genre to this day. The filming was long, meticulous, and grueling, which was harrowing for the actors and creatives involved, but produced a film unlike any before it. Eugen Schüffan did the special effects, which led to him getting a certain technique named after him. The Schüfftian process is one in which mirrors make it look as though actors are inhabiting tiny model sets, which can shift perceptions about scale. This technique had a lasting impact on film and has even been seen recently in the film The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.

What is the film's perspective on femininity? Does it have one?

While it is not explicitly stated, the film re-stages a common gender dichotomy through the character of Maria and her double, the Machine-Man. Where Maria is pure-hearted and peace-loving, urging the workers that if they want change they must find a mediator to help them to harmoniously connect with their superiors, the robot Maria is a witchy and sinfully indulgent woman. In this way, the two versions of Maria represent a Freudian duality between the virgin and the whore. In psychoanalysis, the Madonna-whore complex is used to describe the splitting of the feminine identity into either a saintly virginal one or a debased and sexually illicit one.