Tag Archives: Fritz Lang

Mercy for Monsters: Humanizing child killers and Nazis in M and Inglourious Basterds

Next to Metropolis, Fritz Lang’s M is one of his most famous films. The film’s narrative (police and criminals alike searching for a child killer), the noir lighting, its breakthroughs in sound (introduced a mere four years prior), and Peter Lorre’s infamous monologue all cement M as a classic, even nearly a century after its release.  Meanwhile, Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds is unjustly infamous for its manipulation of history. What I find most fascinating about the two films is how they treat their respective monsters (child killers and Nazis) and how their stories reflect attitudes toward societal ills.

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Complete Version of Metropolis Found

A few weeks ago I sat down to watch Fritz Lang’s most famous film, Metropolis (1927) and during the opening credits the titlecards commented on missing reels.

It seems the original 200+ minute version of the film, unseen since the premiere in 1927, surfaced in Argentina.  The link is to a website that published the article in 2008, but I found it in Empire Magazine, stating a DVD release of the original version in 2010.