Featured facts about Fritz Lang Metropolis Silent Film with Live Music

Directed by Fritz Lang, Metropolis stunned audiences with its pioneering special effects and elaborate production design. Called a “futuristic masterpiece,” the dark plot of Metropolis depicts a classist struggle between industrialists and the workers they exploit, a love story, and an out-of-control robot.

Called a “creatively astute silent film accompanist,” Peter Richard Conte provides a live score in a fully improvised performance that promises a “mixture of levity and technical brilliance" (The Birmingham News).

Conte presides over the world’s largest fully functioning musical instrument (29,000 pipes) at Macy’s Center City in downtown Philadelphia, as only the fourth Wanamaker Grand Court Organist.

Speaking of impressive virtuosity, Northrop’s Aeolian-Skinner Opus 892 pipe organ is so renowned that for decades it has boasted its own fanclub, The Friends of the Northrop Organ! Those fans eventually became the Northrop Organ Advisory Board.

A German Expressionist, director Fritz Lang was called the "Master of Darkness" by the British Film Institute. After emigrating to the US, he became a Hollywood film-noir heavyweight. He continued to make films until the 1960s, some featuring all-star casts including icons such as Barbara Stanwyck and Marilyn Monroe. 

Lang and gifted cinematographer Karl Freund created production design techniques and special effects for Metropolis that dazzled and influenced generations of filmmakers. Its impact can be found in science-fiction films from Blade Runner, Brazil and works from Alfred Hitchcock, to Dr. Who, Young Frankenstein and Avatar in the 21st century. A Sight and Sound critic’s poll in 2012 named Metropolis one of the The 100 Greatest Films of All Time.