Giorgio Moroder's version of Metropolis set in 2026 "a Dickensian 'best of times, worst of times' "

[eShirl]

The year is 2026, a Dickensian " best of times, worst of times," where total oppression and manipulation of the masses is wielded by the unquestionable power of the few.

'In 1984, a new restoration and edit of the film, running 83 minutes, was made by Italian music producer Giorgio Moroder, who paid $200,000 for the rights, outbidding his Cat People collaborator David Bowie. Although Moroder initially intended only to create a new soundtrack, he was surprised by the lack of a definitive print, and expanded his project to a major reconstruction. Moroder's version, which was made in consultation with the Munich Film Archive and their archivist, Enno Patalas, was tinted to emphasise the different moods and locations in the film. It also featured additional special effects, replaced intertitles of character dialogue with subtitles and incorporated a soundtrack featuring songs Moroder composed, produced and recorded with popular artists such as Freddie Mercury, Bonnie Tyler, Pat Benatar, Adam Ant and Jon Anderson. It was the first serious attempt made at restoring Metropolis to Lang's original vision, and until the restorations in 2001 and 2010, it was the most complete version of the film commercially available. The shorter run time was due to the extensive use of subtitles for spoken lines instead of title cards, a faster frame rate than the original, and the fact that large amounts of footage were still missing at the time.

Moroder's version of Metropolis generally received poor reviews. Moroder responded to the critics who lambasted his production for not being faithful to the original in The New York Times: "I didn't touch the original because there is no original." The film was nominated for two Raspberry Awards, Worst Original Song for "Love Kills" and Worst Musical Score for Moroder. However, Bonnie Tyler was nominated for Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 27th Grammy Awards for "Here She Comes".

In August 2011, after years of the Moroder version being unavailable on video in any format due to music licensing problems, it was announced that Kino International had managed to resolve the situation, and the film was to be released on Blu-ray and DVD in November. In addition, the film enjoyed a limited theatrical re-release.

In 2012, the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films gave "Giorgio Moroder Presents Metropolis" a Saturn Award for Best DVD/Blu-Ray Special Edition Release.'

[Maninacan]

1. Soundtrack

Fantastic soundtrack. All of it!