Missing third of Metropolis rediscovered

The Museum of Cinema in Buenos Aires, Argentina, has discovered what may be the only complete copy of Fritz Lang‘s classic 1927 silent film Metropolis. According to Martin Koerber of the Deutsche Kinemathek film museum in Berlin, Germany, “This is the version Fritz Lang intended.”
The film, written by Lang and his wife, Thea von Harbou, is about a 21st century city-state in which the lower class of underworld workers clash with the “thinkers” (capitalist exploiters) who control them. It was one of the most expensive films made to that time, but it was a flop with the critics and the public. Soon after its release, distributors cut the three-and-a-half hour film into the just-about-two-hour version best known today.
According to The Guardian, the cut scenes were in some cases too brutal, and in others, simply cut for length. American distributor Paramount at the time thought the film “impenetrable for the US market,” so the cutting “oversimplified the plot, cut key scenes, and sidelined significant characters.”
Museum of Cinema Director Paula Felix-Didier said a private collector brought an original version of the film to Argentina in 1928, where it languished in the museum’s archives. It was rediscovered in April, and the deleted scenes were combined with the known film on a DVD, which Felix-Didier brought to the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation in Germany in June. The Foundation, which owns the rights to Metropolis, confirmed the scenes were original. Felix-Didier said “The film hasn’t left the museum and it won’t leave until the city government and the Murnau Foundation decide what to do.”
Director Helmut Possman of the Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau Foundation said the uncut film, which is badly scratched, would be made available to the public after it had been restored.
The Guardian says the restored scenes may “solve the mystery of why Maria, the workers’ insurrectionist leader, is mistaken by a baying mob for her doppelganger, a female robot. Schmale, a spy who is sent by the autocratic leader of the futuristic city, Joh Frederson, to pursue his son, Freder, plays a minor role in the cut version, but a significant supporting role in the original.”
The Associated Press has more details here. Thanks to film critic Daniel M. Kimmel for bringing this to our attention.