In what seems like a miracle, the full version of Metropolis has been found sitting in a storage area in Argentina, where it has been since 1927. The versions of Metropolis you normally see are piecemealed together from various sources, but is still missing much footage. This version seems to have everything, but is only a 16mm print (as opposed to 32mm) so the quality isn’t superb. That, and it has been sitting around for 80 years, so it’s all scratched up. But here is a still from the new footage:

Scratchy but usable.

Here is the story:

Lost scenes of ‘Metropolis’ discovered in Argentina

Published: 2 Jul 08 14:51 CET
Online: http://www.thelocal.de/12847/

Lost scenes from German-Austrian director Fritz Lang’s legendary silent film “Metropolis” have been discovered in Argentina, German weekly newspaper Die Zeit reported on Wednesday.

Paula Félix-Didier, head of film museum Museo del Cine in Buenos Aires, discovered an uncut version of the 1927 science fiction film when she looked into reports that a tape in the archive was unusually long. She travelled to Berlin with a copy of the film and met with experts who say they are certain it is the missing original-length version of Lang’s masterpiece that reveals key plot scenes and an expansion of minor roles, Die Zeit said ahead of the publication of its Thursday edition.

Hopefully we can get a full restoration of this masterpiece soon!