Metropolis

Summary: Film
Picking apart the most important elements of Fritz Lang's Metropolis remains a bit tricky due to the massive cuts made when presenting it to American audiences, however: the film takes place in a large city where the workers live underground, toiling to keep the city running. A a robot is created (Maria) which creates discord among the workers. Although the city's central machine is destroyed, the upper and lower classes are superficially and inexplicably reconciled through a symbolic handshake in which both parties are hesitant to participate and that seems not to change a thing.
Summary: Text
The theme of class struggle has been central to most analyses of the film, but Andreas Huyssen, in The Vamp and the Machine: Technology and Sexuality in Fritz Lang's Metropolis, argues that fears of technology and female sexuality are centrally related and that Metropolis attempts to resolve them. An important part of this hypothesis is the way in which the feminine image is constructed, along with the dualities of this construction.
Terms/Concepts/Theorists
Julien Offray de la Mettrie: French doctor and author of L'homme machine, which proposed the idea of the human body as a machine.
Panegyric: as found here on Wikipedia, "A Panegyric is a formal public speech, or (in later use) written verse, delivered in high praise of a person or thing, a generally highly studied and discriminating eulogy, not expected to be critical." In other words, Huyssen wanted to say "eulogy," but with a little more oomph.
Mad scientist: one who dabbles in forces humankind was not meant to control. As such, an overreacher in the tradition of Faust, represented here by Rotwang.
Pygmalion: a mythical sculptor who falls in love with his sculpture.
Vamp: woman who uses sexuality to take advantage of and screw up the lives of men.
Neue Sachlichkeit: "new objectivity," a concept that was popular in 1920's Germany and found expression in art and literature.
For Discussion:
1. Why, in bringing the film to American audiences, did they cut out the bits about Freder's mother?
2. Is the flesh and blood Maria truly asexual?
3. Vision is, Huyssen argues, essential to understanding this film. How is vision in this film similar to or different from its role in E.T.A. Hoffmann's Der Sandmann? Are there any other parallels worth discussing?
4. How has the mechanical Maria, as the prototypical sexy robot, influenced future representations of technologically created or enhanced women?
5. Huyssen states: "The conflict of labor and capital - such was the belief of the Neue Sachlichkeit and such is the implicit message of the film - would be solved through technological progress." The "witch-burning" is cited as evidence, but couldn't Rotwang's innovation have been the answer to the labor issue? Is there something else going on here?
6. Should the film be analyzed in its incomplete form?