Offscreen Notes
Fantasia Metropolis Screening
Fritz Lang’s Metropolis at Fantasia, July 28
Montreal’s Fantasia International Film Festival out did itself with the special event screening of the recently restored (with the new footage found in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2008), that played on the final night, July 28, at the ritzy 3000 seat Salle Wilfred-Pelletier, Place des Arts (an Eastern Canadian Premiere). I arrived just at the screening time, 7:30pm, so missed the cue entering the theatre. I was expecting to find a theatre with many empty seats, but when I stepped through the last door with my reserve seat ticket into the theatre to discover a full house (or very nearly), I was flabbergasted! It is proof again at how sophisticated Montreal audiences are, and a testament to how Fantasia has hit the big time. The buzz of this event will surely be heard all the way to the government cultural funding agencies and should mean an increased profile for Fantasia in future years. Kudos to all the people at Fantasia who worked hard to make this event happen. And what about the screening? The highlight was certainly Gabriel Thibaudeau’s live score, which saw him conduct a 13-piece Orchestra through the newly restored 147 minutes. Thibaudeau’s score took its cue from Metropolis’ visionary, experimental aesthetics, which ranges from the modernist machine montage opening to the Expressionist-tinged Art Deco styling, Futurist/Constructionist technology (the science-fiction elements), and quasi-Gothic touches (the seven deadly sins skeletons, the chase through the catacombs). In other words, Thibaudeau’s score was also on the experimental side, in terms of musical scope, ranging from searing, full orchestration to more subtle, nuanced flavoring. There were a few beautiful, romantic, almost Morricone-like motifs during the more human moments, played briefly enough so as to make you yearn for them. I loved the fact that the electric organ was dominant and that the score resisted the trap of always trying to emulate sound effects for the on-screen actions (of course there was some of this but it did not go overboard). All that remains now is the over-all impression of the score, so I would love to hear it again with a more critical ear. It was easy to detect the 25 newly restored minutes because of the degradation in image quality. In terms of content, the new footage included a whole sub-plot concerning a spy implanted by the father Joh Fredersen to over-see the goings on of his son, an ex-employee whom he fired Joshapat, and the workers. At times the spy, nicknamed “The Thin Man” (played by Fritz Rasp), added a touch of comic relief. In general the new footage seemed to fill in elements of character and plot surrounding the father’s attempt to sabotage the worker’s unity, and takes away from the science-fiction element; however, a full appreciation of the impact of the new footage will have to wait until the imminent DVD & Blu-ray release (I just hope that it has Thibaudeau’s score). The Salle Wilfred-Pelletier is not normally used as a film screening facility, and the digital projection of the film was far from ideal. To begin, the film was projected from behind the back of the screen, which meant it must have been projected off a mirror, which could mean a loss in image quality (read here for an in-depth description of rear screen projection technology). Aside from being rear projected (which can be excellent if projected in the best possible way), the screen itself had three horizontal scratches or creases running the full horizontal length which were visible as hair-line information loss in the image. Depending on the dark/light levels of the action (it was more noticeable in lighter scenes), at times it was barely noticeable, and I’m sure the average viewer may not have noticed it at all; but cinemaphiles who take their projection technology very seriously would have noticed. This minor criticism (of the venue) aside, it was a marvelous night of film magic.
