Lost Metropolis Footage Found

Great news for fans of Fritz Lang's classic silent film, Metropolis: Three reels of long missing footage have been rediscovered in Argentina. The three reels had been acquired by the Museo del Cine in Buenos Aires back in 1992, but only recently were found to include footage that was edited out by the American distributor, Paramount Pictures.

A copy of the film was sent to the F. W. Murnau Foundation in Wiesbaden, Germany, for analysis and verification. Researchers at the foundation confirmed that the scenes were original. "The film can now be shown more or less as Lang originally intended it," foundation head Helmut Possmann told the Reuters news agency. "In terms of understanding what it's about, we'll be seeing a new film."

Due to the poor quality of the film, the restoration may take a few years.

You can get more details on the story at dw-world.de, or, if you speak German, at Zeit Online.