TMI (Today’s Movie Info)
FRITZ LANG directed two ground-breaking films: M and Metropolis
Metropolis (1927) was the first big budget Sci-Fi movie and was said to be Adolph Hitler’s favorite film. The robot became George Lucas’ inspiration for C-3PO in Star Wars (1977).
M (1931) was the first Film Noir and loosely based on the real life serial killer Peter Kuerten, the “Vampire of Dusseldorf”. Germany banned the film in 1934 and it was not released again until 1966. The use of voiceover narration was ground-breaking, as was specific music for a character. Peter Lorre‘s character whistles ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ from Edvard Grieg‘s Peer Gynt Suite No. 1. (although Fritz Lang actually recorded the whistling)
In 1934 Joseph Goebbels offered Lang the position of the Head of the German Cinema Institute. Fritz was anti-Nazi, so he refused and fled Germany soon after. Lang made movies in the U.S. until 1960 and passed away in 1976. His early films influenced future filmmakers such as Alfred Hitchcock, Luis Bunuel and Orson Welles.
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