Metropolis is a monumental work. On its release in 1925, after sixteen months''

filming, it was Germany''s most expensive feature film, a canvas for director

Fritz Lang''s increasingly extravagant ambitions. Lang, inspired by the skyline of

New York, created a whole new vision of cities. One of the greatest works of

science fiction, the film also tells human stories about love and family.

Thomas Elsaesser explores the cultural phenomenon of Metropolis: its different

versions (there is no definitive one), its changing meanings, and its role as a

database of twentieth-century imagery and ideologies.

In his foreword to this special edition, published to celebrate the 20th

anniversary of the BFI Film Classics series, Elsaesser discusses the impact of

the 27 minutes of ''lost'' footage discovered in Buenos Aires in 2008, and

incorporated in a restored edition, which premiered in 2010.