Metropolis restoration: the Argentine duplicate and the score that guided the edit
The Metropolis restoration changed direction in 2008 because of film material preserved in Argentina. A Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung announcement published by filmportal on 2 July identified the discovery in Buenos Aires: employees of the Museo del Cine Pablo C. Ducros Hicken had found missing scenes in a 16 mm negative originating in a private collection. The announcement acknowledged its poor picture quality even while describing the possibility of recovering relationships between characters. The crucial object was a small-gauge film copy containing moving images absent from the materials previously available to the restorers.
The foundation's 2010 premiere program traces that copy back to distributor Adolfo Z. Wilson, who obtained a version immediately after the Berlin premiere in January 1927, before the cuts. Following Argentine commercial exhibition, it passed to film critic Manuel Peña Rodríguez's private collection, then through the Fondo Nacional de las Artes to the Museo del Cine. In the 1970s, a safety duplicate was made from the heavily used nitrate print onto 16 mm negative. Damage and dirt already present in the source were copied along with the images, becoming part of the surviving duplicate.
A joint festival and foundation announcement in October 2009 supplies the measurements behind the loss. Metropolis premiered at Berlin's Ufa-Palast am Zoo on 10 January 1927. The approved version measured 4,189 meters; after four unsuccessful months there, Ufa withdrew it and prepared a 3,241-metre version for nationwide release that summer. These are lengths of film stock, documenting a major physical shortening. The later Metropolis restoration had to reconstruct a work that had circulated internationally through incomplete versions, while the Argentine material preserved a connection with the earlier, longer arrangement.
The 2008 discovery notice names some of what had been missing: Georgy's car journey through the city, the Thin Man's surveillance of Georgy, and parts involving Josaphat. Photographs had previously indicated absent material and characters whose roles had been cut down. The notice also described Enno Patalas's study version, made with Berlin's University of the Arts, which used written, visual and musical sources to supplement surviving fragments. Anke Wilkening, the foundation's restorer, said the newly recovered material clarified previously puzzling relationships. Her assessment concerned dramatic continuity as well as the return of individual shots.
By 29 January 2010, the foundation announced that restoration work was complete. Wilkening described the Argentine material as carrying wear from numerous screenings. Thomas Bakels of Alpha Omega digital reported that the work required specially written software, continuing the use of digital methods begun for the 2001 restoration. The announcement explicitly coupled the possibilities of digital image processing with ethical decisions about restoration. Repairing visible damage was therefore only one part of the job. The surviving film also had to be integrated without pretending that its photographic condition matched the better material.
Music helped establish how the fragments belonged together. In the premiere program, ZDF/ARTE editor Nina Goslar explains that Gottfried Huppertz's score contained more than 1,000 synchronization indications. Its correspondence with the Argentine version helped identify that version's relation to the original premiere editing. It also exposed places where earlier reconstruction had assigned shots incorrectly. An electronic sequencer combined film material with a rendered orchestral score so different edits could be tried against the music. The Metropolis restoration used the score as evidence for sequence and timing, alongside its role as accompaniment.
The completed-work announcement names Fernando Martín Peña and museum director Paula Félix-Didier as the discoverers. It identifies the surviving element precisely as a 16 mm duplicate negative made in the 1970s from a worn Argentine 35 mm distribution print. The recovered material amounted to approximately 25 minutes. Even with advanced restoration, the foundation warned, its difference from the photographic quality achieved in the 2001 version would remain visible. The expanded film could recover action and continuity while still showing the uneven survival of its constituent images. Completeness and image quality were separate problems.
The 2009 announcement also documents the institutional structure of the work. The Murnau foundation collaborated with ZDF and ARTE, the Deutsche Kinemathek in Berlin, and the Buenos Aires museum. The European Filmphilharmonic prepared a new edition of Huppertz's music. Germany's federal culture commissioner announced support of about €200,000, with other support identified from the Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain and the DEFA-Stiftung. Transit Film was assigned worldwide distribution. The discovery in one museum thus led into a coordinated project involving film holdings, musical editing, public funding and the means to circulate the reconstructed version.
ARTE's announcement of 9 February 2010 describes the planned return to performance: simultaneous premieres in Berlin and Frankfurt, with the Berlin gala broadcast live from the Friedrichstadtpalast. Frank Strobel would conduct the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin; Helmut Imig would lead the Staatsorchester Braunschweig in Frankfurt's Alte Oper. ZDF/ARTE supervised the musical reconstruction and a recording made with the Berlin orchestra and Deutschlandradio. The Metropolis restoration brought the Argentine footage into a renewed relationship with the original score, joining recovered pictures, revised editing and orchestral performance in the same presentation.
- Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, discovery announcement reproduced by filmportal, 2 July 2008: Vermisste Szenen aus Metropolis wiederentdeckt — www.filmportal.de
- Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, Berlin world-premiere programme, 12 February 2010, printed pages 14 and 19–20: Argentine copy history and Nina Goslar on the score — www.murnau-stiftung.de
- Berlinale and Murnau-Stiftung announcement reproduced by filmportal, 29 October 2009: original film lengths, partners and funding — www.filmportal.de
- Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, restoration-completion announcement reproduced by filmportal, 29 January 2010: source element, digital work and remaining image differences — www.filmportal.de
- ARTE announcement reproduced by filmportal, 9 February 2010: Metropolis concert broadcast and music reconstruction — www.filmportal.de