Your Metropolis Photos
The slideshow (below) includes some of our favorite pictures from the Silent Film Festival opening night party and the Castro Theater Metropolis screening. To see the entire set, and download your high resolution portrait, visit our Flickr stream here. It was a pleasure meeting all of you during the Silent Film Festival!
San Francisco Silent Film Festival Opening Night
The 15th San Francisco Silent Film Festival kicked-off this past weekend with their opening night party at the McRoskey Mattress Company on Market Street. We were there to celebrate the festival, especially the world premiere of newly restored version of Fritz Lang’s 1927 masterpiece Metropolis. We enlisted the help of Alex Smith, a metal artist, to sculpt a Maria mask which we set against a backdrop of the classic Metropolis film poster. Our photo booth gave the Silent Film Festival party goers the chance to be Maria, the machine-human, one of cinema’s most famous icons, for a moment!
The Castro Theater Screens Metropolis
On Friday night, we were at the screening of Metropolis at the Castro Theater. But this wasn’t just any show—this was the Bay Area premiere of the most complete version of the film, including scenes discovered in the archives of the Museo del Cine (film museum) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The archivists who preserved the missing segments were on hand for an onstage interview with Eddie Muller, and the film was shown with a live score by the acclaimed Alloy Orchestra. After all these years, Metropolis still has people sitting in the aisles!
The Historical Significance
From silents to talkies, Claymation to CGI, film has a long history; organizations like the Silent Film Festival help preserve it, and share rare cinema with an audience that otherwise might never see it. But film is also an archive of history itself. It captures the art, the politics, and the changes that were once new and controversial. Film is a timeline of our shared culture.
The Bay Area has a community that understands the need for film preservation; the San Francisco Film Museum exists to ensure the Bay Area’s cultural history, and that films like Metropolis, will always have an audience.
The San Francisco Film Museum chronicles the rich heritage of filmmaking in San Francisco. Through education and examination of the art, culture, history and science of these motion pictures, the Museum preserves the past and supports innovation that will advance the future of film and digital media in the San Francisco Bay Area.