Silent Subtleties

Sunrise and Metropolis are two films that have recently brought back memories of my childhood and Disney. The particular short invoked in my memory was Disney’s Silly Symphonies – Flowers and Trees. Although short, obviously predictable, and ‘romantically corny’, its ability to use elements within the environment to find solutions to problems and then explain that same environment without language, has always amazed me. In Disney’s simpler story, everything needed was provided in nature. The male tree courts the female tree by playing a harp made of vines, provides her a ring formed by a caterpillar that molds into a circle, and so forth. Similarly, but under more complex circumstances, both Sunrise and Metropolis (Metropolis more so than Sunrise) are able to explain the human heart and human tendencies along with social realities by utilizing the elements in the surrounding environments. Of course, less literal than Disney, Murnau and Lang use the thematic elements of cities, women, labor, moral values, etc. to convey dichotomies found within them with the eternal underlining theme of good vs. evil. The theme of evil and good is found within both films under different scenarios such as: city vs. country, evil woman vs. virginal woman, aboveground vs. underground, and so forth. I found the metaphoric uses of these themes beautifully unveiled through plots, body language, and music, something that silent film was able to magnificently master.

Metropolis is beautifully conveyed through dichotomies between the gods and the mortals, the high and the low. As Alan and David already eloquently depicted, the aboveground is correlated with Olympian-type surroundings and activities, whereas the underground visually and sonorously shows the lack of power mere mortals have in front of powerful deities above, through monotonous and machine-like movements. References to Maloch who is historically associated with sacrifice of children through fire in Christian beliefs (but historically associated with cultures from the Middle East, then Greek mythology), is used as a metaphor to explain Feder’s enlightenment to the class struggles between the high and the low once he is exposed to the underground city of workers. His story also reminds me of Siddharta Gautama’s story, after he left the safe enclosures of his palace and encountered the sufferings of the world. And, since I feel a lack of technical knowledge to adequately critique these films, I can only try to express my awe at Lang and Murnau’s ability to show social dilemmas and subtleties felt in the human heart, without language.
They were able to capture the essence of the ideas and express them through the music of the machines, the ‘monotonous dance’ of humans to their rhythm, and locations within the earth. For example, in both films, human movement was more similar to that of zombies, whenever externally influenced and/or controlled. This zombie-like body language occurred in Sunrise, when the husband was ‘controlled’ by the city woman, and with the workers of the Metropolis. The body language suggests cries of liberty waiting to be revealed, but only when they are able to break the divides from within. I find these subtleties in body language more difficult to recognize when ideas are vocalized as opposed to silently induced. Through silence, they must truly find the necessary elements in the environments to express ideas, which I feel bring me closer to a natural state of things, a shortcut to the tangible world. Not to mention, the machine-man Maria’s movements and erotic dance =) (which I found extremely amusing), which also helped the men get closer to one could say a ‘natural’ state of animal being.

Both Metropolis and Sunrise convey the dichotomies of their themes through Murnau’s City, which could be correlated to Lang’s aboveground. They both hold major flaws and temptations if the human ‘heart is not in the right place’. An example can be money, for cities strive on consumerism, like in Sunrise’s theme park, and in Metropolis, when the man who exchanged places with Freder broke his promise due to money found in pocket. Another ‘city flaw’ was promiscuity. Once Murnau’s husband and wife find themselves in the city hair salon, an unknown man indiscriminately flirts with country wife; and of course, Lang’s Yoshiwara relates directly to promiscuity and money. However, similarly may be said of the country/underground, for temptation under the form of evil women, is able to flow more easily through both, for both films. With Murnau’s city girl so easily implanting herself in the country, and Lang’s machine Maria so easily flowing between both worlds. As stated in Sunrise: Sunrise and Sunset is either sweet or bitter, either in the country or the city (sorry, I don’t have the minutes or the word for word quote). For both, it was the virginal woman who was the driving force that enabled the men to realize their own humanity and spirituality. In Sunrise, it was in the end the wife’s virginal and innocent nature that revived the man’s rational and loving nature. In Metropolis, it was the virginal Maria who inspired Freder’s humanistic revelation.

Although both were enthralling, I truly enjoyed Metropolis’s historical and biblical context, intertwined with its social and spiritual aspects. Even though the overriding theme is essentially laid before you since the beginning of the film: “the mediator between the brains and the hands must be the heart”, it incorporates a series of unexpected twists and turns. Also, like with Disney, I very much enjoyed the musical crescendos, literally expressed in Metropolis under its musical divisions of Prelude, Interlude, Intermezzo, and Furioso, with the times for each scene along with movements becoming respectively faster. I loved it =). I only ask myself, why does it always have to come to near death experiences, in order to have epiphanies?