5pm Friday, July 28 - Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" (1927) - The first screening of a new monthly Sy-Fi film series at the BCP Center

[NewsLady]

This Friday at 5pm is the premiere event of the Boquete Film Club's new "Friday Evening Science Fiction Film Series' at the Fènix Cafe in the BCP Center Hex Room."

Our venue is the Fènix Cafe - which is a restaurant.  So please, don't bring outside food and drinks to the event, but rather, support our film series by patronizing the Cafe.  The Cafe will will be serving  light entrees, fresh popped popcorn, and desserts. Coffee, espresso drinks, herbal teas, lemonade, beer, wine and mixed drinks - will also be available for purchase. 

Early birds get the comfy sofas, but if you like, you can bring cushions for the hard restaurant chairs, or folding/camp chairs for more comfort. There is no admission charge, but we do collect donations to support the program and pay for the audio/video equipment and contribute to maintaining this wonderful facility. 

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This week's film:  Metropolis  (1927 - Germany)  In my opinion, this film is he first great science fiction movie ever made - a restored silent film from what many of us think of as the "Art Deco" period that includes recently discovered "lost" footage.  I can't think of a better way to start our new monthly film series, which will focus on "science fiction for thinking people."  This excellent classic film is quite long at 2hrs, 28 minutes, and there will be an intermission about half-way through the screening.    

From Wikipedia (edited): 

Metropolis is a 1927 German expressionist epic science-fiction drama film directed by Fritz Lang. He and his wife, Thea von Harbou, wrote the silent film, which starred Gustav Fröhlich, Brigitte Helm, Alfred Abel and Rudolf Klein-Rogge... It is regarded as a pioneering work of the science-fiction genre in movies, being among the first feature-length movies of the genre. 

Made in Germany during the Weimar Period, Metropolis is set in a futuristic urban dystopia and follows the attempts of Freder, the wealthy son of the city's ruler, and Maria, a poor worker, to overcome the vast gulf separating the classes of their city.  Filming took place in 1925. The art direction draws influence from Bauhaus, Cubist and Futurist design. 

From "Empire Online": 

The son of the Master Of Metropolis falls for an angelic social worker, while a metal-armed mad scientist creates a gleaming, seductive, female robot to infiltrate the revolutionary movement.

Shortly after its German premiere in 1927, Fritz Lang’s sci-fi classic was cut by a quarter; the longer version was thought lost, but miraculously turned up in an Argentine film two years ago. Astonishingly, the scissor-men didn’t just trim dull scenes — this restores actual plot material (the story makes sense, which it hasn’t for decades), fleshes out many of the characters and adds heroic saving-the-orphans-from-the-flood action beats which makes for a more exciting, satisfying finish. The restored footage is in rougher shape than the rest of the film, which looks so pristine it’s a discovery in itself — and it remains one of the cinema’s most visually amazing films: the 2001, the Blade Runner, the Avatar of its day.

The newly restored footage enhances sci-fi's first masterpiece, making this essential viewing for any movie lover.

Link to trailer