The Machine-Whore of Babylon: Metropolis (1927)

Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast

Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/cCpqMLBg0Ro

Almost one hundred years ago, the great German director Fritz Lang offered us a beautiful yet nightmarish vision of a world strangely similar to our present. Society is unimaginably prosperous yet produces mass misery. There is a sense of an end coming for Babel.

Amidst growing class resentment, the Whore of Babylon appears in the form of a machine invented by society’s elites. This wonder of technology parodies and destroys womanhood, manipulating men’s lust and anger, tempting them away from compassion for their fellow man and the patient expectation of a redeemer.

Scott Hambrick and Karl Schudt from OnlineGreatBooks.com join the show for an entertaining, thought-provoking discussion of the one work of sci-fi on the Vatican film list—not only of its Biblical, political and technological themes, but also its unforgettable imagery and evocative aesthetic, a combination of Art Deco with German expressionism.

Next on Criteria is a Christmas episode on It’s a Wonderful Life, with special guest Patrick Coffin.

Links

Watch Metropolis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvtWDIZtrAE

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Catholic Culture Podcast Episode 27 with Scott Hambrick https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/episode-27-always-wanted-to-study-great-books-heres-how-youll-actually-follow-through-scott-hambrick/

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Online Great Books Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/online-great-books-podcast/id1375330490

Music and Ideas https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/music-and-ideas/id1500358614

Barbell Logic https://barbell-logic.com/

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Music is The Duskwhales, “Take It Back”, used with permission. https://theduskwhales.bandcamp.com/