Episode 251
Metropolis (1927)
Our guest this week is Ayesha of Every Single Sci-Film Ever* where we discuss the legendary film Metropolis. Released in 1927, this science fiction masterpiece of the silent film era was directed by Fritz Lang and based on the 1925 novel by Thea von Harbou. Join us as we discuss the conflicting messages of the film and debate whether Rotwaang was the original tech bro and did Lang intend to make bourgeois propaganda?
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Transcript
Track 2: I have like eight tabs open to eight tabs on two different browsers on two different monitors.
Speaker:Track 4: It's funny. Cause I always have multiple tabs open and I never use them when
Speaker:Track 4: it comes to that discussion. I'm just like dive in and hope for the best unless
Speaker:Track 4: I need to find a quote or something. Um, but yeah, no.
Speaker:Track 2: I wanted to see if there was like basically a list of the intertitles.
Speaker:Track 2: like where you didn't have to like you know like just basically literally just
Speaker:Track 2: all the intertitles like caught you know and like separated out.
Speaker:Track 4: Oh i could have screenshot those for you i can too but you know yeah i wanted it to be.
Speaker:Track 2: I wanted to be lazy and just have them provided to me.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah oh there i did.
Speaker:Track 1: Find one i did find one.
Speaker:Track 4: In my screenshots i've got one two three four five six seven eight i've got
Speaker:Track 4: eight of them i don't know how many there are i just found the whole thing and it has.
Speaker:Track 1: Them both in german and then the english.
Speaker:Track 4: Translation i.
Speaker:Track 1: I just i put it in the chat of the of this app and it has the it looks like it has them based on the.
Speaker:Track 4: Real if i would have done it i would have had them visually just screenshotted
Speaker:Track 4: but you know that's because i'm yeah me too yeah a visual person that's that's a.
Speaker:Track 2: That's a valid criticism of this website oh the.
Speaker:Track 4: Pictures But we're very grateful.
Speaker:Track 1: The pictures, too, is what you're saying.
Speaker:Track 4: Dear website.
Speaker:Track 1: It would be nice if it was actually the screenshot. I'm sure that someone has that.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, so I had eight out of, what was it, 30-something?
Speaker:Track 1: It says over 100, but some of them are...
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, so eight out of 100.
Speaker:Track 1: But some of them are just, you know, Maria. Like, there's no additional,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, context or something later in the film, I guess, when it says that.
Speaker:Track 4: I love the fact it's got it in German as well, just in case.
Speaker:Track 2: Hello, and welcome to Left of the Projector. I'm your host, Bill,
Speaker:Track 2: back again with another film discussion of the left.
Speaker:Track 2: If you'd like to support the show for as little as $3 a month,
Speaker:Track 2: you can go to Patreon.com forward slash Left of the Projector Pod.
Speaker:Track 2: If you'd like to dress the style, we've got shirts, and at lefttheprojectorpod.rentice.com,
Speaker:Track 2: I'll show everyone you've got the best taste of it.
Speaker:Track 2: Wherever you're listening, give us your rating and subscribe so you'll get notified
Speaker:Track 2: of our weekly episodes that drop every Tuesday. We have lots of fun.
Speaker:Track 2: This week on Left of the Projector, we will be silently discussing on the second
Speaker:Track 2: silent film we've covered on the show.
Speaker:Track 2: No, just kidding. We will be talking about the 1927 Fritz Lang film, Metropolis.
Speaker:Track 2: You may have heard about it, especially this year, 2026, as the film was meant to take place this year.
Speaker:Track 2: There is lots of lore and history surrounding Metropolis, and we probably won't even make a dent in it.
Speaker:Track 2: We will, however, try and parse out themes and concepts from a leftist perspective, as always.
Speaker:Track 2: Our guest this week is Aisha, the host of the podcast, every single sci-fi film ever.
Speaker:Track 2: The podcast was the winner of the 2025 Yearworthy Award for Best Movie Podcast.
Speaker:Track 2: Welcome to the show, Aisha. And of course, I'm joined by my co-hosts, Ward and Evan.
Speaker:Track 4: Thank you. Hello, everyone.
Speaker:Track 1: Hello. Thank you for being on the show.
Speaker:Track 3: It's glad to have you.
Speaker:Track 4: Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes. And I mean, before we jump in, we did share the name of your podcast,
Speaker:Track 1: but do you want to tell people what you do over there?
Speaker:Track 4: So I've been a producer for over two decades and I had a really rough couple
Speaker:Track 4: of weeks and I decided I wanted to think about what podcast would I start if
Speaker:Track 4: I could start any podcast in the world.
Speaker:Track 4: And literally the words every single sci-fi film ever came to mind. So I've started in 1902.
Speaker:Track 4: I'm going forward chronologically and we talk about the cultural history and
Speaker:Track 4: the context as well as the filmmaking and all the other stuff.
Speaker:Track 4: I'm not doing every single sci-fi film ever because that's almost impossible.
Speaker:Track 4: So there is an asterisk after that title, which leads to another asterisk that says almost.
Speaker:Track 1: Perfect. Yes. That would be a Herculean effort to do every single sci-fi film.
Speaker:Track 3: No, absolutely.
Speaker:Track 4: It's pretty rough without it anyway, but yes.
Speaker:Track 1: Awesome. Well, I think when we were discussing what film to do,
Speaker:Track 1: so normally what would happen is I usually send a list of films to the guest,
Speaker:Track 1: and they sort of pick a couple, and then we narrow it down to one.
Speaker:Track 1: Whereas in this one, I think we were having trouble, and I think maybe I pitched
Speaker:Track 1: to you doing Metropolis.
Speaker:Track 1: So I'm wondering maybe your history with the film. I know you've talked about
Speaker:Track 1: it other places too, but I guess kind of what it means to you to do this film, such an important...
Speaker:Track 4: So I...
Speaker:Track 4: bought a magazine in the early to mid 2000s, which had a free copy of Metropolis.
Speaker:Track 4: And I've always known it's a film that I wanted to watch, but I literally never
Speaker:Track 4: got around to watching it. I had the DVD.
Speaker:Track 4: It wasn't the full version that they discovered later in the 2000s,
Speaker:Track 4: but I only got around to watching it.
Speaker:Track 4: And it's also one of the reasons I started my podcast. I never get time to watch
Speaker:Track 4: the films I wanted to watch.
Speaker:Track 4: When I was doing the research for my podcast, which was about two,
Speaker:Track 4: two and a half years ago, I would have watched it then.
Speaker:Track 4: it really blew my mind away because there was an element where I thought well
Speaker:Track 4: it's an old film it's going to be you know it's going to be slightly like rickety
Speaker:Track 4: it's not going to be amazing but from the first scene from the credits everything
Speaker:Track 4: starts rolling it's just,
Speaker:Track 4: such a visual delight and so like
Speaker:Track 4: compared to other silent films that I've seen it's so
Speaker:Track 4: so very advanced like visually and yeah
Speaker:Track 4: it's a phenomenal film and then learning about the whole like weimar
Speaker:Track 4: republic and and germany after you know post-world war one all that kind of
Speaker:Track 4: stuff it's such a fascinating period in time um and then and then fritz lang
Speaker:Track 4: who went on to do m which is another phenomenal silent film um and also that
Speaker:Track 4: he might have murdered his first wife so yeah yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: With the help of his.
Speaker:Track 4: Soon-to-be second wife who wrote metropolis that's.
Speaker:Track 1: Partly why i thought like mentioning it in the intro that there is so much about this film.
Speaker:Track 1: You could spend... You could have a podcast on this movie. Literally, I think.
Speaker:Track 1: There probably is one on this podcast, or on this film.
Speaker:Track 1: But yeah, I think it's... I also hadn't... Well, maybe we all can say sort of when we...
Speaker:Track 1: discovered this film i had seen this sometime
Speaker:Track 1: in college but as i was watching it last week and
Speaker:Track 1: then i kind of re-watched some of it last night is i had no memory of any of
Speaker:Track 1: it it was like watching it for the first time and i was just kind of blown away
Speaker:Track 1: by the technical aspects and yeah i just uh we'll get into it too but i'm wondering
Speaker:Track 1: you two bill and ward what are your uh history with it this.
Speaker:Track 3: Is my first time watching it uh i've known about it for years but i was always
Speaker:Track 3: like yeah i'm not gonna watch that i was like similar similarly i was like it's
Speaker:Track 3: gonna be rickety it's a silent movie like it's not gonna be that great boy was
Speaker:Track 3: i surprised that shit's awesome.
Speaker:Track 2: That is very well done yeah it's it's very
Speaker:Track 2: impressive um i saw this the first time i saw this
Speaker:Track 2: was uh many many many years
Speaker:Track 2: ago uh when i was in college uh when i
Speaker:Track 2: took a class on weimar germany uh so
Speaker:Track 2: i actually watched this and fritz lang's m
Speaker:Track 2: uh for that class uh and i kind of
Speaker:Track 2: fell in love with this movie i have seen this multiple times
Speaker:Track 2: since then and the copy i watched is
Speaker:Track 2: actually uh was the uh release
Speaker:Track 2: after they found it was released on like blu-ray after they found everything
Speaker:Track 2: and they they recreated it uh was a gift to me from my in-laws for like a birthday
Speaker:Track 2: or christmas or something i don't remember um but that's like the copy i have
Speaker:Track 2: is like right after they found it and they put it out i'm like you know um,
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. So yeah, this is, as a sci-fi person, this movie has been,
Speaker:Track 2: it's been a, it's been a fixture in my life for a long time.
Speaker:Track 4: I remember when I, when I covered it on the podcast, I kept asking the academic
Speaker:Track 4: and I was like, but is this the most influential sci-fi film ever?
Speaker:Track 4: And because he's an academic, he wouldn't answer the question.
Speaker:Track 4: And I was like, surely you have to just say yes at this point.
Speaker:Track 2: It is like, there's no, to quibble on that seems to be, I mean,
Speaker:Track 2: it's, it's literally, it's, it's it's it's pure pedantry to like not acknowledge that i mean.
Speaker:Track 4: I suppose yeah the thing is when whenever i talk to academics they're so kind
Speaker:Track 4: of like i suppose scientific or very kind of like fact like what what would
Speaker:Track 4: be the criteria of that kind of thing um whereas i enthusiastically i'm like
Speaker:Track 4: yes it is it really is it's.
Speaker:Track 2: Like say it's like asking is the big bang one of the most influential moments.
Speaker:Track 4: Of the development of time.
Speaker:Track 2: In the universe. It's like, yeah, that's when it started. That's when time started.
Speaker:Track 2: So yeah, we're going to go with yes.
Speaker:Track 1: And as I was watching it, there were several times where I messaged both Bill
Speaker:Track 1: and Ward and our separate group chat about, oh, this reminds me of this show,
Speaker:Track 1: Andor, that was just out.
Speaker:Track 1: And I can't even count the number of times as I was watching it.
Speaker:Track 1: Oh, I remember this kind of moment or this kind of theme in a different film
Speaker:Track 1: or a different show or a different thing.
Speaker:Track 1: And even if it's not directly, you know, copying, obviously,
Speaker:Track 1: wouldn't be the right word, but the influence just stamped over so much that
Speaker:Track 1: it's hard to even quantify.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, I think the biggest thing I can...
Speaker:Track 4: probably i don't know again this would be quantifying but with blade runner
Speaker:Track 4: there's there's a threads user called um gark the gray uh who did a side by
Speaker:Track 4: side of like multiple shots across both of the films and it's just it's so stunning
Speaker:Track 4: how how much inspiration it just caused that one film yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: I haven't seen that but that sounds very interesting like to watch.
Speaker:Track 4: I will find it and send it to you yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: Well maybe since there's so much to to talk about this film the thing that Maybe,
Speaker:Track 1: Bill, you also know about it from your class you took, and maybe Aisha,
Speaker:Track 1: since you've covered it and know maybe probably more of the history than I do,
Speaker:Track 1: I was looking into sort of Fritz Lang and the creation of the film,
Speaker:Track 1: and this comes up to maybe a post that I had made on threads that you commented
Speaker:Track 1: on, Aisha, and what do we think—let me think of the way I want to say it.
Speaker:Track 1: So, do you view this film as a sort of reactionary, conservative, tinted film?
Speaker:Track 1: And if so, do you think that Fritz Lang understood that's what he was doing when he made it?
Speaker:Track 4: Bill, you want to go first on that?
Speaker:Track 1: It's a big question.
Speaker:Track 2: No, Aisha, I'd like you to go first. You are our guest, after all.
Speaker:Track 4: Thank you. So, I don't think Lang really cared of the politics of the film.
Speaker:Track 4: I think when you watch this film, and that's the thing, like the message of
Speaker:Track 4: this film, I find really trite and ridiculously silly.
Speaker:Track 4: The whole thing about the mediator between the brain and the hand must be the
Speaker:Track 4: heart. Like it's such a, it's such a non, such a non thing.
Speaker:Track 4: I don't, I don't understand what, well, I do understand what they're trying
Speaker:Track 4: to say, but I think it's ridiculous.
Speaker:Track 4: And so I don't think he cares about that because when you're watching the film, that,
Speaker:Track 4: isn't what you're concentrating on. You're concentrating on a spectacle of such
Speaker:Track 4: magnitude that that's what takes over. And I think that's what Lange cared about.
Speaker:Track 4: He cared about making this phenomenal film. He treated Bridget Helm terribly.
Speaker:Track 4: There's multiple accounts of him not being a very nice person,
Speaker:Track 4: but he made a phenomenal film.
Speaker:Track 4: And I think the Politics of the film probably comes from his wife, Thea von Braun.
Speaker:Track 4: Sorry, Thea von Harbaugh. I've done way too much Cold War stuff. Thea von Harbaugh.
Speaker:Track 4: So not a great indicator generally of what your politics might be.
Speaker:Track 4: And this is made during the Weimar period, which, Bill, you've studied as well.
Speaker:Track 4: I'm sure far more than I, because I just do a few weeks of research for each topic.
Speaker:Track 4: but that's such a fascinating
Speaker:Track 4: and like vibrant time of
Speaker:Track 4: you know various political parties all jousting for power and this huge artistic
Speaker:Track 4: movement and you've got german expressionism and there's so much exciting thing
Speaker:Track 4: like things happening in germany and then you have this like fantastic phenomenal
Speaker:Track 4: film who does which does have like german expressionist like roots,
Speaker:Track 4: but that has this kind of theme which is quite kind of like it doesn't have
Speaker:Track 4: a theme that would reflect that. It's quite a conservative theme.
Speaker:Track 2: So I think...
Speaker:Track 2: I think when you look at it, I think this movie is really fascinating in terms of like its message.
Speaker:Track 2: Because when it was made and the overwhelming influence, like if we look at
Speaker:Track 2: it contextually within the time, like the overwhelming influence of who was
Speaker:Track 2: coming into power and who was gaining cultural influence at the time.
Speaker:Track 2: And yet we look at a lot of the very subtle notes. And this is, this is the key to me.
Speaker:Track 2: This is the one thing that always comes back to me because like last night,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, like we were talking about it, like, you know, in our chat.
Speaker:Track 2: And then my wife and I were talking about it and like, and I do think there's
Speaker:Track 2: one key element in the entire thing that.
Speaker:Track 2: Displays even if lang is not conscious of
Speaker:Track 2: it or intentional um but
Speaker:Track 2: it shows some um unconscious or subconscious
Speaker:Track 2: like thought processes on these things that yes
Speaker:Track 2: this argument that you know you need the heart the mediator between
Speaker:Track 2: the head and the hands whatever that shit right but there's one
Speaker:Track 2: key moment that really belies
Speaker:Track 2: what i think the truth of the
Speaker:Track 2: message is or not what the truth the message how it
Speaker:Track 2: could be taken but that um freighter the.
Speaker:Track 2: City leader who first of all is multiple
Speaker:Track 2: times given nazi phraseology
Speaker:Track 2: to say like deliberately he is given that
Speaker:Track 2: point his his dialogue is
Speaker:Track 2: specifically nazi like
Speaker:Track 2: it is taken direct from nazi like propaganda
Speaker:Track 2: and nazi you know dialogue to the point where
Speaker:Track 2: joseph goebbels was like this should
Speaker:Track 2: not be aired because this shows
Speaker:Track 2: nazis in a bad light and also
Speaker:Track 2: shows the power of large groups of people standing against
Speaker:Track 2: a smaller group of people but one
Speaker:Track 2: of the key elements i think that really well like
Speaker:Track 2: i said whether it's subconscious or unconscious whether it
Speaker:Track 2: was intentional is that freighter specifically says
Speaker:Track 2: it was his goal to make them commit violence so he had the cause and justification
Speaker:Track 2: of using violence against the working class like that to me is the the arc stone of his his,
Speaker:Track 2: of his character and the story overall but also the subtext of the film again
Speaker:Track 2: whether it was intentional or not i don't know but you can't help it you know
Speaker:Track 2: the light shines through sometimes that's.
Speaker:Track 4: What i'm saying yeah i think it's interesting actually because and it's
Speaker:Track 4: freder's son so it's really confusing so it's freder who is the son and then
Speaker:Track 4: this freder joe freder's son who is the dad so just yeah i was yeah i'm sorry
Speaker:Track 4: freder's it's it's it's really silly they could have just not messed around
Speaker:Track 4: like so the son's name is freder frederson but anyway yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: They could have just done it the way that's always done which is the son is the one that says.
Speaker:Track 4: Has the.
Speaker:Track 2: Son in the name but yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: We took i took the meeting correctly go ahead but um yeah so i think that's
Speaker:Track 4: really interesting because i think when i'm watching it i'm with the people
Speaker:Track 4: so i'm like oh this is really this isn't like a bad message but if i put myself
Speaker:Track 4: into the penthouse you're right it's it's an anti anti um elite kind of message
Speaker:Track 4: if you're if you're looking at it from that perspective i.
Speaker:Track 1: Mean that's exactly i think it was at that exact line is when i messaged them
Speaker:Track 1: to say this is for those who have seen and or this is maybe a mild spoiler of
Speaker:Track 1: the show so you can forward ahead 30 seconds if you don't want to hear it but in but.
Speaker:Track 4: In the show.
Speaker:Track 1: Have you watched it oh yeah and watch it yeah okay i thought yeah okay.
Speaker:Track 4: Oh god yes oh god i try and get people who hate science fiction and hate star
Speaker:Track 4: wars to watch that show it's a phenomenal show in fact just pause this go and
Speaker:Track 4: watch all of Andorra and come back.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes, and then you can look...
Speaker:Track 2: And no other Star Wars. You don't have.
Speaker:Track 4: To watch any other Star Wars. Just remember the names of the planets.
Speaker:Track 4: That's really useful and you don't need any other knowledge.
Speaker:Track 1: And you also can listen to our eight-part series on the show. Anyway...
Speaker:Track 1: The way that they created a propaganda campaign on Gorman to make them rebel
Speaker:Track 1: against them so they could use the force against them.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean, it's a story as old as time, but it's so clear that that is the,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, and again, the empire is stand-ins for, you know, U.S.
Speaker:Track 1: or Nazis or fascism or whatever it want to be.
Speaker:Track 1: So it just, that's again where I go back to how influential this film is.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, I suppose I just, I find the solution or the conclusion.
Speaker:Track 4: Like, this guy is a Nazi and he's
Speaker:Track 4: trying to kill you. And let's try and negotiate with him. Yeah, I get it.
Speaker:Track 2: A hundred percent?
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: Again, I feel like if you just keep in mind that one moment,
Speaker:Track 2: if you just keep in mind that one moment, in the end, the message could be taken
Speaker:Track 2: as, you shouldn't trust these fuckers.
Speaker:Track 2: You should not trust them. In the end, it's like, Groot is going up to shake
Speaker:Track 2: his hand, and Freighter and Freighters are standing there.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's like, yeah, on the surface level, it's like, oh, it's very liberal.
Speaker:Track 2: It's very liberal. It's very reformist. Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: But if you just keep that one point in your head, that message is,
Speaker:Track 2: oh, you should not trust these people.
Speaker:Track 2: You should not shake their hands. You should go all the way.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah yeah but instead it shoves the uh the mediator out at you again being like
Speaker:Track 3: no no it's just just a difference of opinion you know you guys are having a
Speaker:Track 3: communications issue you just need a mediator and you can solve all your problems
Speaker:Track 3: it's like no i can't trust that guy okay.
Speaker:Track 4: So i might have tried to kill you and your whole family and all your children but let's negotiate.
Speaker:Track 2: Which also is
Speaker:Track 2: further complicated by the fact that what was
Speaker:Track 2: done was done not at the not at the
Speaker:Track 2: behest of fredersen but at rotvang which i find a fascinating uh division because
Speaker:Track 2: in my eye looking at it in today's context especially you know like we have
Speaker:Track 2: seen a rise of fascism, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: a rise of fascism because it never went away in,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, throughout the West.
Speaker:Track 2: And one of the primary drivers of some of the most, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: like breakneck paces of it, especially within the U.S., has been the,
Speaker:Track 2: the conflict between two factions of the capitalist elite. We had the industry
Speaker:Track 2: and finance versus the tech bros.
Speaker:Track 4: And to me- Is Amy saying Rotwang is a tech bro? Because I'm going to love that.
Speaker:Track 2: I do. I think Rotwang is a tech bro.
Speaker:Track 4: I think Rot- I love that.
Speaker:Track 2: Because historically, the tech capitalists, if we look throughout history,
Speaker:Track 2: tech capitalists have always almost been treated as like second-class capitalists
Speaker:Track 2: Because they're like, they're always the new money.
Speaker:Track 2: They're always new money. And new money is always looked down upon by old money,
Speaker:Track 2: even amongst like the capitalist class.
Speaker:Track 2: And it's like, in a lot of ways, Rodefong really, it's like,
Speaker:Track 2: he's like, I want my credit. I want the power.
Speaker:Track 2: Look at what this cap, like the old school industry finance capitalist has.
Speaker:Track 2: I want that, or I want the recognition, and I'm going to use this against,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, I'm going to use my ability to create technology, which in the end
Speaker:Track 2: is what originally drove his...
Speaker:Track 2: industry because in the end in a
Speaker:Track 2: lot of ways like tech pro capitalists
Speaker:Track 2: were working class at one point like it's rooted tech tech is rooted in working
Speaker:Track 2: class in working class in creation and production and then it is eventually
Speaker:Track 2: co-opted by and then they they get you know it goes petit bourgeois and then
Speaker:Track 2: it becomes bourgeois and that's where we are now.
Speaker:Track 4: I think it's also interesting because he has no social skills and.
Speaker:Track 2: He's quite creepy.
Speaker:Track 4: And so it does kind of, it maps.
Speaker:Track 2: He's Elon Musk, definitely. Like a hundred percent.
Speaker:Track 1: That goes back to what I was looking into with, I mean, you mentioned at the
Speaker:Track 1: top about how Fritz Lang was approached by Goebbels to sort of join the Nazis
Speaker:Track 1: and led to his sort of emigration to the United States.
Speaker:Track 1: But the Nazi idea of technology and like the cult of personality,
Speaker:Track 1: But around the idea of technology and making it this otherworldly thing that
Speaker:Track 1: they could then create and bestow upon the world kind of fits with what, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: the Rotwang's character, in a way.
Speaker:Track 1: He sort of had this secret hidden message that the Nazis, I think,
Speaker:Track 1: would want to control and harness.
Speaker:Track 1: But in this, they couldn't. And maybe that's why Googles wanted to not let people
Speaker:Track 1: see this, because that also shows that they don't control everything in the
Speaker:Track 1: way they want to. Does that make sense?
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah. And also the fact that a lot of those Nazi scientists were kind of like
Speaker:Track 4: working in kind of because they had to, right?
Speaker:Track 4: In times of war, they had to work in kind of secret in kind of hidden places.
Speaker:Track 4: And then they were kind of basically shuttled off to the US and worked largely
Speaker:Track 4: in secret there for quite a while. So yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: Interesting.
Speaker:Track 2: On that secret.
Speaker:Track 4: Well, I don't think Operation Clip was made, Paperclip, sorry,
Speaker:Track 4: was made public for quite a while after.
Speaker:Track 2: No, Operation Paperclip was not made public, but their, in many cases,
Speaker:Track 2: their origins were not publicly known, but their contributions and their individual
Speaker:Track 2: presences were not, in many cases, kept, you know.
Speaker:Track 4: Oh, yeah, no.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. They weren't hidden away.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah, they're still the same dudes just working at NASA now.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. Or put in charge of the UN.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah, or NATO.
Speaker:Track 2: NATO, I'm sorry, yes.
Speaker:Track 1: How do you, just like slightly, maybe not the same topic, but we learn as when
Speaker:Track 1: Frederick ends up sort of deciding he wants to see what the working class,
Speaker:Track 1: well, first we see him sort of gallivanting in this perfect,
Speaker:Track 1: perfect little garden, which is a really funny scene.
Speaker:Track 1: you know sort of like the garden of eden or something and
Speaker:Track 1: then he's like oh there's this this sort of this woman
Speaker:Track 1: and i want to you know find her and he ends up taking the place of
Speaker:Track 1: working class person and then going into the depths what do
Speaker:Track 1: we my note that i wrote down was that maria was
Speaker:Track 1: sort of the view of class consciousness that
Speaker:Track 1: she was trying to bestow upon the workers and then it's later maybe co-opted
Speaker:Track 1: but then there's also the mediator i don't know what you all think of what like
Speaker:Track 1: maria was meant to sort of uh represent or what it represents to you and then
Speaker:Track 1: the mediator as this thing that they were referring to but we don't really learn
Speaker:Track 1: about until the end i guess i.
Speaker:Track 3: Feel maria is still like just holds on to that pretty liberal idea of like she's
Speaker:Track 3: very idealized and like oh the workers are upset she's going to be the manifestation
Speaker:Track 3: of their um like alienation and frustration but she's going to,
Speaker:Track 3: like in controlling interest eyes like oh we're gonna have her be very liberal
Speaker:Track 3: where it's like oh we need to just have a communication we need to wait on basically
Speaker:Track 3: a savior to make this happen instead of i don't know take action in her own hands.
Speaker:Track 4: She is she is such a an image of purity in that kind of very old-fashioned way
Speaker:Track 4: for a woman like she comes up with all the children,
Speaker:Track 4: um and we have no understanding as to why Fred that like Fredo falls head over
Speaker:Track 4: heels in love she's not said a word she's like come up children look at your brothers here um,
Speaker:Track 4: It doesn't make any sense. But she is this kind of idealized puritanical, I guess, almost ideal.
Speaker:Track 4: I mean, the idea that she's also running this, what is it, like a church in
Speaker:Track 4: the catacombs where all these men are just following her.
Speaker:Track 4: I'm like, that's probably, you know, like when religion and is she leading the
Speaker:Track 4: congregation there? We don't know what's going on.
Speaker:Track 4: It's extremely unrealistic. And it's another reason why this film is quite silly,
Speaker:Track 4: even though it's amazing.
Speaker:Track 2: The the the religion aspect of
Speaker:Track 2: it feels very opiate of
Speaker:Track 2: the masses um very much
Speaker:Track 2: the like kind of like sucker for the people you know
Speaker:Track 2: they don't have anything else um they have
Speaker:Track 2: this and they are given hope um it
Speaker:Track 2: reminds me of i don't know
Speaker:Track 2: it actually reminds me of a movie we literally just did an
Speaker:Track 2: episode on uh they live by night and
Speaker:Track 2: where a character says you know i
Speaker:Track 2: ain't gonna give you hope when there ain't any and in
Speaker:Track 2: this it's like it's very it's it's
Speaker:Track 2: the opposite it's like they're always gonna the people or
Speaker:Track 2: the the ideology meant to keep the working class
Speaker:Track 2: oppressed is always gonna give them a
Speaker:Track 2: glimpse of hope because that's the only thing that
Speaker:Track 2: keeps them pacified to the
Speaker:Track 2: point where like you know it is explicitly stated i
Speaker:Track 2: think when i forget who somebody says i
Speaker:Track 2: think it might have been rough on where he says to um
Speaker:Track 2: the only thing keeping the workers in check is the promise of the mediator and
Speaker:Track 2: that is like something we constantly return to you know it's like the that's
Speaker:Track 2: the only thing just give them the hope that there will be something that there
Speaker:Track 2: will be changed that they're that we can move forward um.
Speaker:Track 2: And I really do think that, like, I think that if you want, it depends,
Speaker:Track 2: very much depends on where you come from as a viewer for this film.
Speaker:Track 2: If you watch this as a person without any basis in, like, Marxism or,
Speaker:Track 2: like, class consciousness, if you come at this from a liberal perspective,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, no theory having, you're going to have a wildly different interpretation of it.
Speaker:Track 2: A vastly different interpretation. And I struggle to justify Lange not having any of that.
Speaker:Track 2: Like, there's no way the Lange at this time made this film without any of those
Speaker:Track 2: things in his head just because of the time period.
Speaker:Track 2: It's impossible. I just, I find it difficult to believe that none of those,
Speaker:Track 2: none of that was subtextually put in there by him, you know, against, you know.
Speaker:Track 2: without his knowledge, you know, or, you know, full intention,
Speaker:Track 2: but like, you know, I can't imagine it didn't get in there because of the time,
Speaker:Track 2: just because of the time. Yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: 10 years after the, uh, the Soviet revolution as well.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. Like this just, I, you have to look at media in the, in the context of the time it was made.
Speaker:Track 4: Absolutely. But he didn't write it. And also there's people,
Speaker:Track 4: you know, there's people today who, who you'll meet them in,
Speaker:Track 4: in all types of places who will be like, I'm just not into politics.
Speaker:Track 4: I just, I have no interest in it. And I don't, you know, like,
Speaker:Track 4: or, you know, even Andy Weir, lovely guy that he is, it just went on that podcast
Speaker:Track 4: and was like, well, I don't like my science fiction being political.
Speaker:Track 4: And it's, it's like, well, everything's political. Like you can't divorce those
Speaker:Track 4: things, but some people just are like that.
Speaker:Track 4: So I don't know if, I don't know if, if that was kind of, um,
Speaker:Track 4: actually, I suppose there are some threads in it with M as well.
Speaker:Track 2: Isn't there yes so yeah i think i think
Speaker:Track 2: you're correct a hundred percent like you will
Speaker:Track 2: but i also think that like it is
Speaker:Track 2: impossible to divorce yourself that's
Speaker:Track 2: why like you cannot remove the author from the material because no matter what
Speaker:Track 2: just like you can't remove politics from the author or the world from the other
Speaker:Track 2: you are shaped by your outside circumstances whether you even consciously know
Speaker:Track 2: it whether you consciously did these things like you've been shaped by it and you will put your,
Speaker:Track 2: the impression of those things on the things you make,
Speaker:Track 2: whether you know it or not, when you walk in mud,
Speaker:Track 2: you leave footprints and you know, we are all the clay that is shaped by the, by the world.
Speaker:Track 2: And as we shape things as well, we leave those impressions behind us. It's impossible not to.
Speaker:Track 2: And yeah, Andy Weir is amazing.
Speaker:Track 2: but there's no like but
Speaker:Track 2: he has still been shaped by the world and his films regardless of what he says
Speaker:Track 2: still betray certain you know sentiments regardless of what he claims and the
Speaker:Track 2: critical drinker is the podcast and that man is a moron what.
Speaker:Track 1: What oh i was just gonna say well i mean And you pointed out,
Speaker:Track 1: Aisha, that he Fritzlein didn't write the film. It was written by his then wife.
Speaker:Track 1: And I had a point there. Oh, well, so, so, yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: So that almost makes it even more interesting to me because we learn later that she joins a Nazi party.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't know what her ideology was specifically at the time she wrote,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, when she was writing this film, but it feels like she probably Nazi ish. Yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: But in some ways it, then I almost think of like, what's, what's going through
Speaker:Track 1: her mind where she understands this divide between the working class and the,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, the capitals class, and yet seems to,
Speaker:Track 1: yeah, I mean, I guess it's kind of a muddled, her, go ahead,
Speaker:Track 1: I can tell you about the season.
Speaker:Track 4: So what I've learned, and I don't know much about Thiavon Harbaugh, is that she has,
Speaker:Track 4: came from Bavaria. And there, there was a very big kind of, you know,
Speaker:Track 4: in terms of mythology and belief systems, they were quite religious.
Speaker:Track 4: They had very kind of set beliefs on what religion was.
Speaker:Track 4: And so all the themes around, you know, you've got the seven deadly sins there,
Speaker:Track 4: you've got death, and you've got... So when she's saying like,
Speaker:Track 4: have faith and hope, I don't think she's saying that cynically.
Speaker:Track 4: I don't think she's saying that as someone who believes in the opiate of the
Speaker:Track 4: people to manipulate them.
Speaker:Track 4: I think she's truly saying it that, you know, if you're a worker and you're
Speaker:Track 4: in a bad state, then there's going to be a savior that's going to come and say,
Speaker:Track 4: I think she's saying it with sincerity.
Speaker:Track 4: And that does change the context again of the story.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, I was looking at her Wikipedia page. It says she came from like a minor
Speaker:Track 1: nobility family of government officials too.
Speaker:Track 1: So she's coming in from that perspective too, of understanding the role of the
Speaker:Track 1: government or the leaders in the plight of the people.
Speaker:Track 1: Again, this is, you know, I'm going based on just a couple of lines.
Speaker:Track 1: I don't have the full history.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. I think there's also like a vast difference in the way the,
Speaker:Track 2: those like older kind of like ruling
Speaker:Track 2: class people viewed things and their relationship to the other classes.
Speaker:Track 2: It's a huge difference between the way they viewed things and the way the ruling
Speaker:Track 2: class today views the working class or the other people. It's a huge difference.
Speaker:Track 2: Not like that it was great, but it's not the same.
Speaker:Track 4: The thing is that in the Weimar Republic, okay, you've got Hitler in the background
Speaker:Track 4: and you've got all of his, like he's been sent to prison and he's written the
Speaker:Track 4: book and he's, you know, you've got his rise, the book, Mein Kampf.
Speaker:Track 4: So, you know, that's happening in the background. But at the same time,
Speaker:Track 4: there are revolutions and there is a strong like communist history in the 1920s as well.
Speaker:Track 4: And it's not just a, like I said, it's very revolutionary. and
Speaker:Track 4: there are people who are being murdered and then it's um i
Speaker:Track 4: spoke to a guy joshua polanski for for this
Speaker:Track 4: film um quite recently so there's an article he wrote uh
Speaker:Track 4: where we're having conversation and he mentioned so an evil maria
Speaker:Track 4: is being burnt at the end like she's she saw that as a revolutionary figure
Speaker:Track 4: because she okay she's being we know that she's being manipulated to cause this
Speaker:Track 4: kind of uprising but also if you remove that just the imagery of that person
Speaker:Track 4: who is telling the masses you need to come,
Speaker:Track 4: you need to revolt in a time where people have been murdered for having those kind of belief systems.
Speaker:Track 4: And I think he mentioned Rosa Luxemburg, who was murdered.
Speaker:Track 4: When stuff like that's happening, it's not like a very subdued type of political
Speaker:Track 4: landscape in which it's just the Nazis rising to power.
Speaker:Track 4: They then blame the communists for the burning of the Reichstag, right?
Speaker:Track 4: it's a very politically volatile time. And so I don't think this film is,
Speaker:Track 4: it's not saying, it's not like particularly going one way or the other.
Speaker:Track 4: That's why it feels very much like, well, it doesn't seem particularly political what Lang is saying.
Speaker:Track 4: He's not really talking about the workers rising up.
Speaker:Track 4: And he's saying that there's a hierarchy, or at least that's what I get from it. I don't know.
Speaker:Track 1: And a consequence for doing that, right? I like that.
Speaker:Track 1: The interesting that the burning of her at the stake regardless of who it ends
Speaker:Track 1: up being she is seen as the scapegoat that then can be you know burned for their
Speaker:Track 1: attempted bringing of class consciousness to the to the masses.
Speaker:Track 2: This i mean like if we look at it from the
Speaker:Track 2: perspective of like like you said like aisha like how like all this is going
Speaker:Track 2: on part of this has to do with the fact that you know like like any other film
Speaker:Track 2: it's a collaborative process so we're going to have multiple viewpoints a director
Speaker:Track 2: you know regardless of the screenplay the director is going to bring their vision
Speaker:Track 2: upon it as well and it's going to shape it in its own way,
Speaker:Track 2: and at the same time like what you know,
Speaker:Track 2: Like Harbaugh and like how, you know, like you said, like, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: she's deeply religious. I mean, like educated and at a convent,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, deeply religious.
Speaker:Track 2: And viewing all this, if we look in a lot of ways,
Speaker:Track 2: Metropolis can be viewed as a holistic piece that is really can be viewed as
Speaker:Track 2: the struggle of these individuals that created it to come to terms with.
Speaker:Track 2: and understand all of these ideas at the time that are conflicting with each
Speaker:Track 2: other, that are coming into conflict and are proliferating.
Speaker:Track 2: That, you know, which is, you know, like, what is the correct,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, where do you come down?
Speaker:Track 2: How do I feel about this? Like, in the end, like, in a lot of ways,
Speaker:Track 2: it really does feel like a meditation created by these individuals so they understand,
Speaker:Track 2: like, what is happening in the world?
Speaker:Track 2: And where do I come down on this? What do I think?
Speaker:Track 4: It's interesting, actually, because while you're talking, I looked up,
Speaker:Track 4: because we had the production code in Hollywood, which prevented any kind of
Speaker:Track 4: super political films or anything that was considered too risque being made.
Speaker:Track 4: And they had something similar in Germany called the Reich Moving Picture Law
Speaker:Track 4: from 1920 to, I believe, 1934, after Hitler came into power.
Speaker:Track 4: and that was here it
Speaker:Track 4: says that all films had to be mandated by the
Speaker:Track 4: government to protect public safety and safety and then youth from like you
Speaker:Track 4: know corruption and stuff like that so it'd be interesting to know how much
Speaker:Track 4: like in that case you wouldn't be able to you'd have to have the type of content
Speaker:Track 4: that was you know given the okay by the government in that regard anyway yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: But despite that we know no matter what there,
Speaker:Track 2: There's always subversive information always, always bakes it through.
Speaker:Track 2: Like they're incapable of catching everything.
Speaker:Track 2: And sometimes just because they literally don't understand it. The people.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, that gets that way going back to the, you know, Ro Twang is the like the tech bro.
Speaker:Track 1: I think about all of the tech bros who look, they name their companies like
Speaker:Track 1: Peter Thiel names his companies after.
Speaker:Track 1: you know after things from lord of the rings where they don't they don't understand
Speaker:Track 1: the movies and books because of their worldview or their just inability to you
Speaker:Track 1: know for a variety of reasons,
Speaker:Track 1: so it does make sense to me that uh the people watching this wouldn't necessarily
Speaker:Track 1: understand like the film you just refer we just did an episode on uh they live
Speaker:Track 1: by night a noir from the 40s.
Speaker:Track 1: And it was basically written by a communist during the time when they were censoring
Speaker:Track 1: films, but a lot of messages still seep through.
Speaker:Track 1: So, you know, despite these rules, the, yeah, what is it, life finds a way in Jurassic Park?
Speaker:Track 2: The left finds a way.
Speaker:Track 4: It's like, you've seen that famous, what is it, the Torment Nexus tweet that someone tweeted out?
Speaker:Track 1: I feel like we say that a lot.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, I say that a lot, especially with a sci-fi podcast. It's like,
Speaker:Track 4: it's Torment Nexus week again.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. It's always Torment Nexus week.
Speaker:Track 4: It is, goddamn.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah, I like what you were saying, Bill, like, them trying to,
Speaker:Track 3: like, this is, like, a display of them, like, just trying to figure out the
Speaker:Track 3: politics, because, like, some of the shit just don't be making sense.
Speaker:Track 3: Like, Robot Maria gets the workers to fucking destroy all the machines,
Speaker:Track 3: but then they turn against her because,
Speaker:Track 3: like, they think she took their kids when she was saving them um like it's it's
Speaker:Track 3: very silly and confusing at times yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: But blaming women's like a.
Speaker:Track 1: Really long term you.
Speaker:Track 4: Know yeah it's a it's a good good thing to kind of like hedge your bets on yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: At the time it's super easy to do.
Speaker:Track 4: When i'm in doubt i.
Speaker:Track 1: Always blame a.
Speaker:Track 4: Woman you know.
Speaker:Track 1: Well like just the idea of the
Speaker:Track 1: you know the witch hunt and those kind of things going back you know
Speaker:Track 1: centuries from this immediately i wrote down like that's
Speaker:Track 1: the the scapegoat you're going to have you know you're going to refer to it
Speaker:Track 1: as a witch as these secret powers but really it's just you're afraid of the
Speaker:Track 1: patriarchy you're afraid of the women uh you know having some kind of power
Speaker:Track 1: and you have to burn them to uh make yourself feel better yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: And also the fact that this maria is ultimately the good maria is ultimately
Speaker:Track 4: the heroine of this film and again it's at a time when like when you read about,
Speaker:Track 4: the creative side of Weimar Germany, that kind of, I mean, you've got the German
Speaker:Track 4: expressionism, but, you know, Joselian Baker had come to Berlin and it's like
Speaker:Track 4: there were clubs and nightclubs and this, all of that is considered kind of
Speaker:Track 4: evil and bad and the Yoshihara Club,
Speaker:Track 4: again, with like a, you know, a foreign name kind of thing.
Speaker:Track 4: Like it's demonized in the story.
Speaker:Track 4: And again, that's probably Harbaugh's like religious sentiment that this is
Speaker:Track 4: all decadent and indulgent type of stuff.
Speaker:Track 2: The reason that like i watched this
Speaker:Track 2: the first time and watched m is because my
Speaker:Track 2: you know history professor at the time was very much adamant it's like the best
Speaker:Track 2: way to understand the context of a historical period is to view the cultural
Speaker:Track 2: products and the way those people and Weimar Germany was such a radical time period,
Speaker:Track 2: you know,
Speaker:Track 2: that formed and proliferated in reaction to World War I and like the economic, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: spiral and then, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: went one way and then in the end.
Speaker:Track 2: led to the rise of Nazis. Like, you can't separate any of this from that time
Speaker:Track 2: period. And like you said.
Speaker:Track 4: Aisha— He sounds like a good professor.
Speaker:Track 2: He was a good professor.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: I went to school for—I mean, I didn't actually graduate college.
Speaker:Track 2: But I went to college for writing, and I ended up actually taking so many history
Speaker:Track 2: classes, I essentially double majored.
Speaker:Track 2: And most of them were with him. uh but yeah like you know this i forget where
Speaker:Track 2: i was going sorry that was my fault i interrupt.
Speaker:Track 1: Just the context of history and the you know
Speaker:Track 1: through the time period and the and the film makes perfect sense
Speaker:Track 1: like what you were saying yeah the other thing that i noted when i was watching
Speaker:Track 1: this that we haven't really maybe quite touched on is the i kept writing down
Speaker:Track 1: when they're well first when they're showing the the guy that he takes that
Speaker:Track 1: that uh freder takes places with where he's literally moving these dials when
Speaker:Track 1: the lights go on, which also just,
Speaker:Track 1: I wrote down just sort of ridiculous jobs that don't need people and they could
Speaker:Track 1: be automated, but in the real world, they automate them not to benefit the working
Speaker:Track 1: class, but actually to hurt them.
Speaker:Track 1: And the automation that they then could have with this robot woman that's a
Speaker:Track 1: robot that's been created,
Speaker:Track 1: it could do those jobs and then let these people live a nice life,
Speaker:Track 1: but that's not how the ruling class wants to use AI today or technologies, unfortunately.
Speaker:Track 4: Don't fembo.
Speaker:Track 1: Like Austin Powers.
Speaker:Track 2: The creation of the robot actually, especially the way it is created in this film, it really...
Speaker:Track 2: My issue with that is that, and the fact that the way the robot is created in
Speaker:Track 2: this film belies the fascistic nature of the capitalist class and the ruling class in general,
Speaker:Track 2: because even when they create a robot, they don't just create an automated system,
Speaker:Track 2: they create a person.
Speaker:Track 2: she for all intents and
Speaker:Track 2: purposes as far as we is essentially a person
Speaker:Track 2: with conscious like sapience but
Speaker:Track 2: no free will so it's like they just want
Speaker:Track 2: slaves they just want slaves they constantly they just want to create slavery
Speaker:Track 2: they that's all they want they just want slaves it never ends and it's like
Speaker:Track 2: even when they can create something that would be automated no it's It's got to be a person,
Speaker:Track 2: too, because the suffering is the point, you know?
Speaker:Track 4: That scene's phenomenal, though. It's such an amazing scene, like visually.
Speaker:Track 2: Which one?
Speaker:Track 4: When we get Maria being transferred into this, yeah. Well, when robot Maria gets...
Speaker:Track 2: A facelift?
Speaker:Track 4: A facelift, yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean, to talk about how, I mean, we alluded to just the incredible practical
Speaker:Track 1: effects, but the body cast that they built for her to be in it,
Speaker:Track 1: for Bridget Helm to be inside, is just amazing.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean, for folks, you can, you know, there's a couple of, maybe we can put
Speaker:Track 1: some links to some of the effects stuff in here, but it's just phenomenal.
Speaker:Track 2: Also torturous. again as as i
Speaker:Track 2: should point it out earlier like lang was not a
Speaker:Track 2: good person and every like not only
Speaker:Track 2: was he not a good person he was not
Speaker:Track 2: actually a murderer sorry yes potentially a
Speaker:Track 2: murderer but like notorious as a director for
Speaker:Track 2: being cruel to the cast like he
Speaker:Track 2: as a director believed the best way
Speaker:Track 2: to get those true emotions out of your cast
Speaker:Track 2: was to actually make them that miserable like
Speaker:Track 2: that was that was his actual directorial philosophy
Speaker:Track 2: it was like you know what frankly your acting isn't good enough i'm actually
Speaker:Track 2: like the um when the the flooding is happening like that water was cold and
Speaker:Track 2: he made them stay in it for hours on end and it wasn't like you know it was
Speaker:Track 2: like no just you stay there.
Speaker:Track 2: That's the point. Like, go and be miserable.
Speaker:Track 1: And then Stanley Kubrick said, hold my beer. Let's see what I can do to Shelley Duvall.
Speaker:Track 4: And these men make really good films. Damn, that's...
Speaker:Track 2: He was known, he was known to be like a real...
Speaker:Track 2: especially on this film especially on this film yeah he's tortured helm.
Speaker:Track 1: The scene where they create her i couldn't help i mean
Speaker:Track 1: i think when i looked it up this actually was the influence was you know the
Speaker:Track 1: the mary shelley's frankenstein like the creating of that the bubbling flasks
Speaker:Track 1: and the whole electricity it was such a all of the sets are incredible i mean
Speaker:Track 1: just unthinkable in 1927 i just it's hard to believe that they made this it's.
Speaker:Track 4: Funny actually because i i i'm blown away by it like in the 2020s and and it's
Speaker:Track 4: amazing to me to think that people watching it in 2027 were like.
Speaker:Track 1: Or just.
Speaker:Track 4: Didn't like it or like you know like it's like what are you doing with your lives guys.
Speaker:Track 1: Truly well.
Speaker:Track 2: I mean there there are practical effects this movie that,
Speaker:Track 2: we lost the technology, like the ability to do for like years.
Speaker:Track 2: Like it's, we didn't just lose the prints of this movie.
Speaker:Track 2: We filmmakers lost the ability to do some of the things they did in this film
Speaker:Track 2: that made it look as seamless and perfect as it does.
Speaker:Track 2: And I honestly, like, I think, I think part of the reason that people at the
Speaker:Track 2: time are like, eh, is like when,
Speaker:Track 2: when you create something so seamless they
Speaker:Track 2: like i think there was like actually like a certain perspective people
Speaker:Track 2: are like well like that's just real
Speaker:Track 2: like you just filmed a real thing because like i i think they like
Speaker:Track 2: like if we see something phenomenal now we could
Speaker:Track 2: be like that's a computer like you made that on a computer and that's impressive
Speaker:Track 2: that's artistry but at the time they didn't have that so like someone physically
Speaker:Track 2: made that and they're like they have to assume that like either that's a real
Speaker:Track 2: thing that existed or like somebody you know physically made that it's like
Speaker:Track 2: okay you know that's like a real set okay you know.
Speaker:Track 1: But there were but there were also i mean not that you're not just saying that
Speaker:Track 1: you're wrong but then i think of when you get to a lot of the
Speaker:Track 1: the charlie chaplin films in the 30s the some
Speaker:Track 1: of those silent films with like modern times and
Speaker:Track 1: the the technology they you know the special practical effects
Speaker:Track 1: not special practical effects they do there those were viewed i think differently
Speaker:Track 1: maybe 10 years or i don't know those were viewed more positively as far as this
Speaker:Track 1: is really impressive like the scene in modern times i don't know if you've seen
Speaker:Track 1: it where he's roller skating and it looks like he's about to fall into the,
Speaker:Track 1: into a um down a stair shaft but they do it by gluing the scene onto a piece
Speaker:Track 1: of glass behind the camera and it's just amazing we've lost that craft we've lost that craft.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: It's really funny to me because H.G. Wells apparently hated this film.
Speaker:Track 4: And he said it was a very silly film. But I get the feeling.
Speaker:Track 3: It's kind of silly.
Speaker:Track 4: It is silly.
Speaker:Track 3: It's kind of silly.
Speaker:Track 4: But I wonder if it's because H.G. Wells was so kind of like tech positive that
Speaker:Track 4: the idea of using tech to kind of like, you know, cause damnation on a population.
Speaker:Track 4: I wonder if that's, I should read his full, I probably did at some point,
Speaker:Track 4: read his full article on that.
Speaker:Track 1: Which is ironic given the way that the sort of the person creating the technology
Speaker:Track 1: is treated or is viewed in the film itself.
Speaker:Track 1: Like this, using the technology, I don't know. It's some kind of irony that I can't.
Speaker:Track 2: Do you mean that he's like looked down upon?
Speaker:Track 1: Yes, exactly.
Speaker:Track 2: I feel like that goes, you know.
Speaker:Track 3: It goes back to what Bill was saying.
Speaker:Track 2: It's like they're always seen that way.
Speaker:Track 2: It's almost like the capitalist class, like the ruling class, like.
Speaker:Track 2: There is a certain level. It's like finance capitalists, especially that it's in its purest sense.
Speaker:Track 2: It's just money. It's just money and expropriation of labor finance and like industry.
Speaker:Track 2: It's like, it's just, it's the expropriation of labor and money.
Speaker:Track 2: It's as pure as it can get. It's like a vampire.
Speaker:Track 2: They're like, you know, I will not drain the blood of an animal.
Speaker:Track 2: Only humans. It's like, has to be pure, has to be the pure purest form of oppression.
Speaker:Track 2: It's like, Oh, a tech pro capitalist?
Speaker:Track 2: Oh, wait, you thought something up and you made something?
Speaker:Track 2: Oh, good for you. Good for you. Oh, you're also a billionaire,
Speaker:Track 2: but you actually put some effort in at some point. It's not good enough.
Speaker:Track 4: That is kind of true, because the idea of the kind of upper classes,
Speaker:Track 4: you know, the idea of work is looked down upon. Like, you should have investments.
Speaker:Track 1: What's wrong with you? Where's your capital?
Speaker:Track 3: Oh, you made something? How pedestrian.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:Track 4: It's like in, oh, what's that British drama with lots of rich people?
Speaker:Track 4: I can't remember. And she's like, what? No, the other one, the older one.
Speaker:Track 4: What's a weekend? Like, every day is a weekend, because I'm rich.
Speaker:Track 2: Downton Abbey.
Speaker:Track 4: Downton Abbey.
Speaker:Track 2: Bridgerton is not a.
Speaker:Track 1: British I knew what you meant even though you said the wrong thing.
Speaker:Track 2: Like i feel like elon musk
Speaker:Track 2: elon musk has never made a
Speaker:Track 2: goddamn thing but even like the fact that he claims that he did is what in in
Speaker:Track 2: the eyes of the other that like other faction of capital is what makes him lesser
Speaker:Track 2: and like why he's not allowed to go to epstein's island because you know,
Speaker:Track 2: he did work at some point, or at least claims,
Speaker:Track 2: he claims to have done work.
Speaker:Track 1: A scene that I'm curious what that was interesting when Maria is now in bed
Speaker:Track 1: or, you know, the robot version of Maria is doing sort of this,
Speaker:Track 1: I guess you could call it like a brulesque show for the men was,
Speaker:Track 1: well, what I wrote down when I, when that happened was sort of like this,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, bread and circuses or something where the, you know,
Speaker:Track 1: she's pacifying the masses.
Speaker:Track 1: but that scene is not to mention also the camera work of also when freder freder
Speaker:Track 1: is uh having his sort of getting sick and all the camera uh the sort of having this fever dream.
Speaker:Track 4: It's really amazing both of those scenes were phenomenal but i.
Speaker:Track 1: Don't know what to maybe to make of that maybe i'm making too much of it.
Speaker:Track 4: I don't think she's pacifying them because she's i suppose
Speaker:Track 4: she's a distraction yeah for for the but these are these are upper class people
Speaker:Track 4: who are coming to this yoshua club right um so she's a distraction for them
Speaker:Track 4: but they're they're fighting over her right like they're getting like incensed
Speaker:Track 4: with like lust and then they're like they break out in fights in the club so yeah that.
Speaker:Track 2: Is road vong that is his ploy to further so discontent not just amongst the
Speaker:Track 2: working class but amongst the other bourgeois so that he can gain power like that's him,
Speaker:Track 2: destabilizing the entire system. That's his intention.
Speaker:Track 2: You know, she was never supposed to do that.
Speaker:Track 2: Like, according to Freighterson, like, she was supposed to go incite violence
Speaker:Track 2: amongst the workers. That's it. So he could be violent against that.
Speaker:Track 2: She was never supposed to come up top and do stuff. That's what,
Speaker:Track 2: when he's like, you know, Rodefong says to, I think Freighter,
Speaker:Track 2: he says he's like, you know, but, you know, he was, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: I fooled him that she's under my control.
Speaker:Track 2: You know, that I, she takes orders from me.
Speaker:Track 1: I think that he's, she, that Fraderson refers to her as an obedient tool,
Speaker:Track 1: which I thought was a, you know, very specific line of this,
Speaker:Track 1: you know, we can control this.
Speaker:Track 1: But then when she becomes uncontrollable is when, you know, all breaks loose
Speaker:Track 1: and leads to the flooding of the, you know, the working class city,
Speaker:Track 1: which also the effects on all of that was amazing.
Speaker:Track 1: I mean, can't say that enough times in this movie.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. I think my favorite line of the entire film, though, is,
Speaker:Track 2: Father, Father, will ten hours never end.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: That was so good. I've been there.
Speaker:Track 2: It really says everything. It's like, it says everything about the plight of
Speaker:Track 2: people who sell their labor. Will ten hours never end.
Speaker:Track 1: Especially in that ridiculous, you know, again, that whatever he was doing with
Speaker:Track 1: the little hands and the lighting of the little bulbs.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, what is he doing? Is he trying to like give them more time to finish their
Speaker:Track 4: work? Or is he trying? I don't understand what he's doing.
Speaker:Track 1: It just looks amazing.
Speaker:Track 2: There's a temperature gauge.
Speaker:Track 4: But I feel like that's a clock. Is it not a clock? I don't know.
Speaker:Track 3: I felt like he was like, it's very clock shaped, but I feel like he's attempting to complete circuits.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah, yeah. That's what I got.
Speaker:Track 3: To prevent a temperature from going up for some reason.
Speaker:Track 2: That's how I saw it. Because it's like, if he doesn't get into the thing, the gauge goes up.
Speaker:Track 1: Also, the scene where the initial accident happens and there's that meltdown
Speaker:Track 1: and Frederson is talking to him through a screen. the way they were able to
Speaker:Track 1: project it looking like that was also very impressive in.
Speaker:Track 4: 1927 yeah i think it's really funny that guy who's sent to spy on fredo like
Speaker:Track 4: why does he just why does he just know where he lives because like that's his
Speaker:Track 4: boss's son like his dad doesn't know where he lives what.
Speaker:Track 1: Was that guy's name did he have a name the the oh the fin man right right,
Speaker:Track 1: I wrote down just a goon when I was, when he first introduced,
Speaker:Track 1: cause I didn't remember his name.
Speaker:Track 3: He was a good goon.
Speaker:Track 1: A very good goon. Yeah. He was very menacing.
Speaker:Track 2: I, I do think that like part of like the, the whole like, oh,
Speaker:Track 2: this is silly, especially like, you know,
Speaker:Track 2: is like, it is difficult, especially as someone, you know, like who,
Speaker:Track 2: you know, like we've, we've, we live now, you know, like all the movies we watch, what we've grown up.
Speaker:Track 2: it is difficult to separate from certain like just the context of like just
Speaker:Track 2: the mannerisms like the way a silent film is acted is so exaggerated and like over the top.
Speaker:Track 4: That like there is.
Speaker:Track 2: There is part of it like i i have to think that like especially because like
Speaker:Track 2: the way orwell made stuff and like the way orwell was like yeah he was always
Speaker:Track 2: going to like call that silly because like he was so you know like the way.
Speaker:Track 4: You mean hg wells it was silly yeah hg.
Speaker:Track 2: Wells it's so like more you know bombastic in a lot of ways.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah and and the thing is all silent films are probably overactive because it
Speaker:Track 4: is overactive right because there's no words we we need to we need to know what
Speaker:Track 4: you're feeling maria um and and.
Speaker:Track 2: Boy does she convey.
Speaker:Track 4: With that face with a heart hand on her heart half the time um yeah and her hands as claws,
Speaker:Track 4: the robot maria yeah yeah but yeah i don't know i think i want i think it got
Speaker:Track 4: like quite a few bad reviews like when i was i remember when i was looking at
Speaker:Track 4: before and so i don't know why why do we why do we forgive those kind of silly
Speaker:Track 4: things now and why did they not get blown away by the spectacle then it's just interesting to me yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: She was she was fantastic i mean i mean,
Speaker:Track 1: incredible in the movie i mean so good yeah all of her expressions yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: And she was what she was 17.
Speaker:Track 1: Or something she.
Speaker:Track 4: Was very young when she she made the film.
Speaker:Track 2: To be fair i mean critics are historically and notoriously terrible so you know.
Speaker:Track 1: You know saying a movie is terrible at the time and then you
Speaker:Track 1: know with with a you know uh what is it uh yeah a
Speaker:Track 1: re uh reevaluation like oh that movie was great
Speaker:Track 1: i saw that recently with something
Speaker:Track 1: where everyone trashed the film oh you know what it was it was showgirls because
Speaker:Track 1: that movie was panned by everyone and then sometime recently a bunch of those
Speaker:Track 1: same critics come up to elizabeth berkeley and tell her how much they love the
Speaker:Track 1: film and she just can't help but just not care what they think because they
Speaker:Track 1: all said bad things about it when it came out so i've.
Speaker:Track 4: Never seen it but i have seen reviews of it like i think i think the fact that
Speaker:Track 4: it like i think people just completely missed that it was supposed to be a commentary.
Speaker:Track 1: Every time they'll make a movie again.
Speaker:Track 4: Like with like with robocop right like it's it's yeah it's the same director
Speaker:Track 4: guys you could have to switch on it.
Speaker:Track 1: Put the pieces together like my roman empire when it comes to uh people misrepresenting
Speaker:Track 1: them on the internet is there anything else uh aisha that you uh had in your
Speaker:Track 1: notes that we haven't maybe touched upon um.
Speaker:Track 4: No i think i think we've covered like a lot of stuff here like we've covered
Speaker:Track 4: religion and and politics and and how amazing the film looks like those are the main things i think.
Speaker:Track 1: What are you worries you have anything else or any uh notes i mean you i mean
Speaker:Track 1: well you mentioned that you called it a color revolution when we were in our little chat too yeah.
Speaker:Track 3: Yeah no i yeah because like um yeah because robot Maria uh,
Speaker:Track 3: basically takes all of the um all the
Speaker:Track 3: frustration and consciousness of the
Speaker:Track 3: workers and sends it towards the machines which
Speaker:Track 3: ends up uh creating the disaster which floods the worker city and threatens
Speaker:Track 3: the children's lives um and it's like it wasn't like an actual worker red led
Speaker:Track 3: revolution it was one led by a fucking machine created by a bourgeois tech bro.
Speaker:Track 2: When you said that, what it made me think of was the outside agitator message.
Speaker:Track 2: And every accusation is always a confession. It's like, oh, it's the outside agitator.
Speaker:Track 2: Every time we find out, oh, actually, that was placed there by the CIA or the cops or whatever.
Speaker:Track 2: Every time, it's outside agitator.
Speaker:Track 1: I think we already talked about the ending with, you know, the handshake between them.
Speaker:Track 1: And I think the note that I wrote down is that this was like the worst union
Speaker:Track 1: mediator or union representative ever.
Speaker:Track 1: Just this is our deal, guys. Come on. We didn't want this.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah. What are your demands? You don't have any demands? Okay, great.
Speaker:Track 2: No demands. No demands. Nothing. No demands.
Speaker:Track 4: We're just going to go back to work and you can try to kill us again if you
Speaker:Track 4: want. That's fine with us.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah, you also destroyed all of our homes and our city, so where are we going to live?
Speaker:Track 4: Oh, maybe we can come up to the surface, sir. Maybe.
Speaker:Track 1: And the thing that I also, I mean, this is maybe going back slightly,
Speaker:Track 1: but when the, you know, Frederson doesn't seem to really care what's going on
Speaker:Track 1: until the power goes out in his, you know, above the ground.
Speaker:Track 1: And when their lives are disrupted is the only thing that actually leads them to care.
Speaker:Track 4: Or when his son is threatened, yeah. Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: So take note, capitalists or working class people.
Speaker:Track 4: Or don't, because we have no device. We will go back to work.
Speaker:Track 4: Because we have a mediator who's come along. And yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: Well, I mean, just two days before, the day before recording this,
Speaker:Track 1: there is the woman who set the toilet paper factory on fire for not getting
Speaker:Track 1: paid good wages. So I guess there
Speaker:Track 1: are people that are taking some of these matters into their own hands.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah, it's interesting. I think a lot of these things, in terms of when people
Speaker:Track 4: act, usually happens when the economy gets terrible or people are in terrible,
Speaker:Track 4: terrible situations. Yeah.
Speaker:Track 4: I just think, I get the feeling that's not yet in a lot of places. I don't know.
Speaker:Track 1: I agree completely.
Speaker:Track 3: No, it's starting. I mean, there was an eviction in California that turned into
Speaker:Track 3: an active shootout with police.
Speaker:Track 4: Whoa, I missed that.
Speaker:Track 1: Yeah. Material conditions has not deteriorated enough, but I think we're...
Speaker:Track 3: We're going to get a lot of that in the future.
Speaker:Track 2: Yeah. Ward has been saying, for probably the past year, what is it?
Speaker:Track 2: like you've been saying like we are in the beginning of our our years of lead in the u.s.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah well all.
Speaker:Track 2: That guy said he all he kept saying on that video is all you do is pay us a living wage oh.
Speaker:Track 4: God burn.
Speaker:Track 3: That warehouse down.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah and it's so sad because like
Speaker:Track 4: you know like the cost of like energy
Speaker:Track 4: like utility bills in the uk just keeps going through the roof
Speaker:Track 4: and there's you know every winter i mean the government are intervening um to
Speaker:Track 4: a degree but you know the the bonuses and the and the profits don't change they
Speaker:Track 4: keep going up it's just like well what that's not it's just not workable long
Speaker:Track 4: term you can't you can't have little ladies dying in the winter and and being
Speaker:Track 4: like well at least i got more profits yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: I just saw this is maybe unrelated but i just saw that the frito-lay who owns
Speaker:Track 1: you know doritos said they lost a billion dollars last quarter because they
Speaker:Track 1: They raised the prices of their chips so high that everyone just said, I'm good with that.
Speaker:Track 1: And now they're like, oh, we have to reduce our prices.
Speaker:Track 1: And so, I mean, it's not very... It's rare where they actually make any kind
Speaker:Track 1: of course correction like that. So, unless there's a loss of profits.
Speaker:Track 4: Yeah.
Speaker:Track 2: Here we have our energy bills going up because of data centers.
Speaker:Track 4: Oh, it's also horribly scary, but yeah.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes, but...
Speaker:Track 1: Aisha, from the Every Single Sci-Fi Film Ever, Asterix, Almost Ever,
Speaker:Track 1: thank you for coming on Left of the Projecture. It's great having you.
Speaker:Track 4: Thank you, almost. Yeah, thank you so much for having me on.
Speaker:Track 1: Of course. And you can follow your
Speaker:Track 1: podcast and our podcast on pretty much everywhere that podcasts are sold.
Speaker:Track 4: Or they're actually not sold.
Speaker:Track 1: They're free.
Speaker:Track 4: They're free. So get them while you can.
Speaker:Track 1: Sold Asterix.
Speaker:Track 4: They're cheaper than Doritos.
Speaker:Track 1: Yes. But wherever we're finding podcasts are free, we let them have,
Speaker:Track 1: anyone can have them and listen to them.
Speaker:Track 1: But thank you again. And you've been listening to Left of the Projector as Evan,
Speaker:Track 1: Ward, and Bill. We will catch you all next time.
Speaker:Track 2: How's it going, everybody?
