past futures photo gallery

Past Visions of the Future
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Past Futures Photo Gallery

Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1926)
Austrian director Lang’s futuristic fantasy, set a century after he made his film, reportedly was the most expensive German silent film ever made, costing the equivalent of $150 million in today’s dollars. Like King, Lang imagined a future city filled with towering Art Deco skyscrapers, where the most privileged inhabitants lived far above the ground. But the filmmaker’s vision also had a darker side. The majority of Metropolis’ residents lived underground, where they did the hard, dangerous labor necessary to operate the complex machinery that kept the glittering upper part of the city running. Ultimately, the proletarian masses — incited by a female android — rebel against the established order, leading to a cataclysmic struggle.

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