Focus 2004.tif 68 Pom] on German Studies Shakespeare, William. The Temput. London: Penguin, 1994. Smrch, Wolfgang, cd. Explosion 0/ a "'lemory Heiner Milller DDR Eill Arbeitsbuch. Berlin: Edition Hentrich, 1988. Walia, Shelley. Edward Said alld the Writing qf HIJt;;ry. Cambridge: Icon Books, 2001. "Gebraucbt wurden 100 Neger, 25 Chinesen": Colonialist Fantasies in Fritz Lang's A1etropoiis (1927) Richard John Ascarate T he phrase cired in the tide of this paper appears as part of a statistical table in the trade journal UJa-Magazjn and celebrates the unprecedemcd quantities of film stock, props, and extras used in the making of Fritz Lang'S fururisoc spectacle, Mdropolis (1927).1 A10ngside the word 'Neger' one sees a small sketch of a black man, naked save for a grass skirt. No morc than seven black men actually do appear in the film, the other ninery or so of thei r cohort remain unaccounted for. A corresponding image of a Chinese is absent from the table. Indeed, Lang depicts no Chinese as such in his film, though the advertised ethnic actors undoubtedly play the}tlptlllmwho run the nightclub Yoshiwara on the outskirts of New Babylon. Both groups, Asians and blacks, are [0 be found, framed an d contained as it were, in the nightclub scenes, bearing either papet Ltnterns for the white man or the white man himsel f. Whatever technological benefits - and they are many; sophisticated, graviry-defying architecture and transportation systems, electronic communication devices, powerful generators - the future holds for the teeming white masses of New Babylon, none seems to accrue to the city's racial minorities. T his paper examines a shon scene, perhaps [he mOSt inexplicable of (he film, one in wluch the robot-Maria makes her erotic debut, Boticelli-sryle, writhing atop the glistening backs of rhe aforementioned black actors. \'\fhat may have motivated Lang [0 construct such a tableau, one that Thea von Harbou's novelistic treatment of the Metropolii S[OfY, which preceded the film, does nOf depict? A quick survey reveals that he reiterates the image in some of his previous films, among them Dr. Mabuie, de,. Spieler (1922) and Die Nibelungen (1924). In each of these, an object of desire lies just beyond the reach, peepshow fashion, of the spee+amr. Expanding the invesugation to include other synchronic cultural products, one sees that certain visual elements of the debut scene may be traced through the contemporaneous wo rks of artists 70 Focus on C(P!ltllt StudilJ such as Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, George Grosz, and Maria Ubden, among others, through [he 1926 Berlin run of rhe so-called "Revue Ne:gre" starring Josephine Baker, and even through pedestrian advertisements in journals like DLr QlImchnill.2 Diachronically. the framing and nudity of the black men continue a German filmic tradition of ethnographic signification, ooe that served ro thematize a presumed lack of evolutionary development among black Africans relative to white Europeans. Finally, projecting forward, Metl'opoliJ seems to offer a troubling answer to a question then debated in the Reichstag about the fate of Germany's black population and "Rhineland Bastards." The roles of subjugated Africans and Asians in the film may be seen to recreate a German colonialist fantasy whose political reality had been only recendy brought to an end by the First World War and would sbordy be taken up again by H itler. This paper argues, then, that while the scene of the robot-l\'laria's debut - shot rnrough with the rraces of several contemporaneous aesthecic, ethnographic, and policical discourses - may border on kitsch, it is also the most representative of the Weimar era in the enme film. Aes the tic One seeks in vain among Lang's vast and Lifelong commentary on MelropoliJ fo r direct references to what may have inspired the debut scene, while decades of secondary Literature Likewise remain silent upon the maller. T hrust back upon his o r her own devices, however, the close reader of Lang's oeuvre soon finds thematic and visual suggestions among some of the directOr's previous films, as though he returned a82in and again to the theme so as to embellish and perfect. Thus, U1 Dr. AtabJlSe, Jer Spitler, a semi-naked woman descends from lhe ceiling above a vast round gambling table in the Petit Casino, a visual disrraction should the police break in upon the illegal gambling, her sexuality is underscored her by nesdi.ng he~elf upon the presumed site of flora l reproduction. Once (he danger of arrest has passed, the woman ascends inro Ille rafters, enveloped within the wooden petals of her blossom-like platform. In Nibe/JlrJgm I: Sietfiieds Tod, the dwarf Alberich treats the eponymous hero to a tantalizing vision of vast wealth, an image that disappears Colonialis t Fanrasies in Metropolis 71 when Siegfried reaches out to touch it. Lang seems to suggeSI In dlese scenes, perhaps self-referentially, that pOwer lies with the one who can control dle vision of me spectator. Such narcissistic p rojeClions of direcrorial control are not unusuaJ in \Xfeimar cinema, another example being staged in Robert Wiene's Das Knbinett des Doktor Caligari (19 19), wherein Caligari drives members of dle sideshow audience back when they try to touch me sleeping Cesare, thus denyi ng them tactile privilege. (I f read aloud, the boastful tenor of the Ufo-Magozin Metropolis advertisement also suggests cllC spectaclilar p romises of dle carnival barker, a pan played by Caligari outSide of the tent prior to Ius own show.) The invitation to robar-Mana's debut reads: "Mr. CA. Rotwang requesrs the pleasure of Your company at di nner and [Q see a new Erotic Dancer." Lang does indeed serve a visual feast to bOlhdiegetic and nondiegetic spectaw rs, but on his own terms. He leases rather than satisfies through images of desired objects, be they gold or naked women. The peepshow-like, vanishing qualiry of the visuals defers spectator satisfaction, while quick cuning in Aielropolis belWeen Images of the robot-Maria and the faces, then the eyes alone, of the gentlemen in the audience p~radoxkally obJecunes the laner rather than the former (Fig. la). Fig. I a - Gentlemen rcndereu as objects in Metropolis 72 Focus 011 German StNdiu Fig. I b - A possible visual antecedent [0 the unusual still in F ig. Ia. Source: D~r QJltmhnitl. 2-3 (1922/3): t 19. As if to underscore the inaccessibility of the desired object, the last shor of the debut sequence fcaruIes the robot-t-.1aria high above the reaching hands of the men below. Again, Lang objectifies the male spectators rather rhan rhe fe male dancer, representing them merely th rough their outreaching arms and hands (Fig. 2) . Colonialist Fantasies in Metropoli1 73 Pig. 2 - Objectified men, cut by the frame, their backs to the oon­ diegeuc specta tor, only their reaching hands discernible. Besides visuals fwm Lang's own work, other possible traces of lhe shell-like apparatus in the debut scene may be localed within the graphic ans, both ruswrical and contemporaneous, bOlh high and low. A number of paintings, engravings, Lithographs., and phmographs o ffer themselves for comparison and contemplation (Ftg. 3), suggesting lhat whatever else may change by 2026, lhe supposed time in which the story of A{elropolis takes place, certain aesthetic codes regarding the display of feminine beauty remain lhe same. 74 FONd on G l ntlan Studiu Fatz Lang, MttropoliJ. 1927 BoticdL, Vema, c. 1485 Fig. 3a - Robot·Mana atop her shell and similar visual thematic ueaunencs. Colonialist Fantasies in flil t iropoliJ 75 .. 't'lj'I~1 1:1 ~1. : "'rJ .,t3!1 ~It I (,1: I., 1"11' 'I" ·"" ".,; I C [NTRAl-M III UN~I Fig. 3b - Advertisement III Otr QlftrIChnill. 4 (1924): 188. E thnographic While not pretending to ecltnographic authenticity, the brief dt:picuon o f the black m en in MelropoliJ nevertheless recalls rurn­ o f-the-cenrury documentary films o f Africans and New GUineans • 76 Fool! on German Sflldiu by German photographer-anthropologists such as Rudo lph P& h and Hans Schomburgk. ShOt before the First World \'(far, when Germany still pos~ssed African colonies, films by these and other ethnographers served several functions. First, they brought home to Germans in a way hOlh inexpensive and accessible representations of colonial possessions, thus helping to secure a "unined German identity" (Oksiloff 5) amidst European powers that had already divided much of the noo-Western world amongst d1emseives. After the psychological uauma and colonial losses incurred by the outcome of the war, such rep resentations of the native body figured further "as a lost unity and provided a vanishing point for a fantasy of coherence and wholeness" (6). Just as early films made fo r entertainmemrarner than edification had precursors in the theater, so tOO did these ethnographic fi lms. Specifically, the practice of placing ethnographic showcases, or Vt;//eerschoJlen, on tour had begun in 1876 when Hamburger Carl Hagenbeck, dealer to circuses and zoos of wild animals, began to imparl for exhibition natives of German colonies in Africa, along with lheir t:.raditional clothing, implements, weapons, and omer paraphernalia. (Hagenbeck had initiated me practice wilh arguably less exotic Lapplanders and reindeer two years before.) His shows were runaway successes, uacking as mey did German and European conquests in Africa, evenrually including Zulus, Inuit, Dinka, :r-.-faasai, Ashanri, Indians, and even Native Americans. O ne of the earUest exhibits, that o f Nubians in Breslau, atrracced over thirty thousand visitors on the firs t day alone (l-Iagenbeck 84).} And similarly, as wilh the treasured items and curiosities described in lhe examples of \"('eimar cinema above, distance between spectator and ethnographic subject was stricciy enforced. T hus, the Uvin g native exhibits had [Q remain within their prescribed framework, bOl.h phYSically and behaviorally, the "boundary between tlus world and that of the citizens visiting and inspecting them, bet\veen wildness and civility, nature and culture, had ro be respected unconditionally" (Corbey 344). In most exhibits, native subjects were prohibited from addressing the spectato rs and from behaving in a manner (hac would betray Western acculturation. Under such viewing conditions, the European spenamr stood nor only in physical opposition [0 {he Uving ethnographic subject, but meoreticaUy on the opposite end of Colonialist Fantasies in MttropoliJ 77 me evolutionary scale.4 \Vesterners were thus staged as victors in the "ascent to civilization, depicted as the inevitable triumph of higher races over lower ones and as progress through science and imperial conquest" (341). After Germany had lost its ho ld ings in Africa, ethnographic f1lms enabled its citizens to continue the fantasy of colonial and evolutionary ma5[ery by sustaining a visual code that construed me colonized "as a poputuion of degenerate types on the basis of racial origin, in order to justify conquest and to establish systems of administration and con5(ruction" (l3habha 70).s T hat me Germans could seriously entertain such a notion was formiwusiy reinfo rced by archaeological acciden t. Since the discovery in 1857 of a complete human skeleton in the Neander vaUey near Dusseldorf, scholars had begun to propound the theory that Germany was the site o f the origin of man, the fossil providing physical proof of what Leo Frobenius, prominent German evolutionist, "designated as lhe 'last Unk' between man and apes" (Oksiloff 6). O ne of the morc famous early ethnographic film fragments, Rudolf P& h's BJlJhman Speaking into the Phonograph (1908), featu res a Kalahari Bushman relating a Sto ry into the cone of a phonograph. Oksiloff con tends that the fragment depicts a "coupling of the first and last links of the evolutiona ry chain" (ibid. s?). Thu is, the Bushman, wearing only a loincloth , possessed o f little more than a grass hut, a few animals, and wooden or S[Qne implements, sits opposite to one of the most advanced products of modern technology, an electro-mechanical recording device. T he image presumably lc:gitimated ideas of Western superiori ty and justified the West's continued colonial presence in third world countries. Regarding the black man's capacity to fu nction within a modern European sociery, one observer who had spcnt a good deal of time in Africa contends tha t if is "nich t daran zu zweifeln, daB der Neger allch komplizierte Maschinen bedienen kann, wahl abc! daran, daB er je cine erfinden wird. Denn sein Genius ist nicht sch6pferisch, weder politisch !loch tcchnisch noch kiinstlcrisch, noch in religioser Bcziehung" (Heuser 839). These interrelated discourses of ethnographk filmmaking, 'V6Ikerschauen,' evolution, and coloniaUsm may be connected to the debut scene of MelropoliJ in lhe following manner: Once robot-Maria has risen from her shell-like casing, she must stand above the silent, stationary black 78 Fonts Oil Germdll SiudieJ men (Fig. 4). Because they neither spea k no r move, they possess a 50rt of timelessness in contradisoncnon [ 0 the frenzied activity of the white actress. One recalls the number of scenes in A·[ttropolir in which a dock- or watch-face appears, cither to register the time or, in Ole: case of Feeder's assumption of worker 1 1811's duries, to torture, validating Simmel's observation that " the technique o f meu opoHtan life is unimaginable withoul the most puncrual integration of aU activities and mumal relations into a stable and impersonal time schedule" (415). What Cochey observes of the living ethnographic exhibits in the 'Volkaschauen,' that U[w)hat is seen, Ihe objectified Other, is looked on as coming { ... ) fro m a different, allochronic rime" (36 1), applies equally well to me black men kneeling in the Fig. 4 - Black men holding up {he case from which dIe robor·t.'laria will momentarily emerge. Colonialist Fantasies in Metropolis 79 debut scene. They are situated on the bottom of the evolutionary scale staged within the frame, beneath the white woman who moves in ciock"Work rhythm. Despite their own State of undress, [hei r unmobility q uells an y subconscious feus of miscegenauon between themselves and {heir animated burden. A further irony arises when o ne considers that the ro bot-Maria is nor completely human, that only her exterior layer, her skin, I)ossesses ar least [he semblance of human life. Underneadl this layer, however, lies a complex technological mechanism. What the tableau suggests, (hen, is that sUlI higher on the evolutionary scalI: from black man to wlme woman stands dle cyborg, a combInation of man and maclune. Certainly, the unea sy relationship berwcen lhe lance [wo motivates much of the plebian rampage in MetropoliJ, JUSt as that same tension was visually thematized by Xami Schawinsky shortly befme Lhe initial screening of the film (Fig. 5)6: Fig. 5 - Xanti Schawlnsky, Top DOllcer verjUJ Tappillg Machille, t 924. 80 FocuJ on German SJlldiu If one rerums [0 {he norion that the director eonuols specratOr vision, the visual of [he black men holding up the whi le woman assumes a more disturbing dimension. Specifically, in eady ethnographic fi lms, the image " becomes a stand-in for an absent reality by isolating one segment of the object world" (Oksilo ff 26). Lang nor only metaphorically objectifies the black men by having them serve as supporlS to the robot-tv[aria, he also cinematically transforms them intO objecrs through a subrJe cross-cut, replacing them with srarues of the seven deadly sins.. Although this replacement occurs in a sequence of shots mar seems [0 alternate betwec:n the reality of evenrs at the Yoshiwara and [he hallucinations of Freder's fevered brain. Lang's temporal near-juxraposition of the pedestal supports suggests a visual equivalence. The direcror perfocms a simila r trick onscreen in Die NibelulIgtll when the dying Alberich commands the dwarf prisoners bearing the pOt containing dle Nibelungen treasme to magically become statues of themselves.? T he dwarf-king teUs the prisoners thal he is reruming them to the dust from which they came. In lhis sense, he holds the power of God over them, JUSt as Lang does visually avec the black men of Metropolis. The 'dust' to which [hey cerurn, however, is not some indiffe rent mineral substance, but is instead fashioned intO representations of evil such as lust, gluttony, and sloth, a transformation mat will be treated later D a n ce In 1uempcing to unravel some of dlC many discourses running through the debut scene, one cannot overlook the robot-t. laria's sexualized dance. The cinematography used to record her choreography may have had antecedents in early ethnographic documentaries. As Farimah Tobing Rony observes of such films, "[dJances by indigenous peoples were projected as wild, 'savage: frenz ied movements by people laclcing rationality" (65). Lang cenainly stages the robot-Maria's dance this way, as a hyperaccive spectacle for observers who are kept at a distance. An ironic paraliel belween eth nographic dance sequences and the debut scene obtains when one recalls that natives captured in [he for mer more ofren than not performed fo r the camera, rather than spontaneously, and Colonialist Fantasies in Metropoli! 81 at the request of the cameraman/anthropologist. Nevertheless, when presented in E uropean theaters, these documentary films were marketed as 'authentic' recordings of indigenous rituals and behavior. (rhus, in pre-Benjaminian fashion, tbe natives also acted for modern spectators whom they wou ld never rn eet.) Likewise. inSlcucled to fool rhe humans. the robot-Maria presumably does not believe in the authenticity o f her sexually arousing cho reography. Rotwang's juxtaposition of enligh tenment science and savage jazz through the vehicle of a robot bod}' also points to a contemporaneous discourse of conRice about the nature of the new American musical and dance fo rm. Certain ly, the robot-Maria may owe some of he.r erotic gyrations to eady styles of Exp ressionist dance, p hotography, and graphic an (Fig. 6). Rudolf KoppirL., Dallcer, 1925 Friez Lang, ilIetropoli!. 1927 Fig. 6a - Contemporaneous dance and visual frends. 82 Foal! on Gml10n SllIdiu Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Nochlrogt, I927. 1931 George Grosz, Baja lan~> 1921 Fig. 6b - Contemporaneous visual trends. Observe the nudity of the dancers and the: angularity of !heir mQvements, sirrular 10 those exhibited by we robot-Maria. Yet in 1926, onJy a year prior to the inicial screening of AfttropolU. the black American dancer Josephine Baker had created a sensation in Berlin with the jazz c:nrcrlainment troupe, the Revue N~grc. Introduced to Germany through minstrd shows even before the First World War, jazz had enjoyed a conrraruclOry reception there. simultaneously signifying complex and conRkling meanings and ideologies. Jazz sryle in music and dance connoted jungle eroticism and savagery, but also the incursion of America n technology and Ford­ style production methods. Jazz rhythms simulated mose of indusuial machines, even as they induced a loss of self-conuol by surrender to them on the nightclub dance Roor. Black musicians. singers, and dancers memse1ves both fascinated and repeUed, occupying that hybrid posicion of the stereotype whereby the "confliCl o f p leasure/ unpleasuce, mastery/defence, knowledge/disavowal, absence/ presence, has a fundamemal sigmficance for colonial discourse" (Bhabha 75). Count !-larry Kessler, who had seen Josephine Baker perform and had entertained her personaUy afterwards, caprures this tension in his diary entry of February 17, 1926: Colon.i.:ltiSI Fantasies in AltlropoljJ Abends wieder in die Negecrevue bei Nelson Qosephine Baker). Sie sind ein Minelp[Odukt zwischen Uewald und \'(Iolkenk.ralZer; ebenso ihre Musik, der Jazz, In Filrbung und Rhythmu5- Ulu:amodern und ultraprimitiv. Ole Weitc dec 5pannung cneugl den zwingenden 5til; ebenso wie bei den Russen. (458)' 83 In Mt/ropoliI, Lang masterfully CO-OptS the frenz ied style of jazz choreography, retaining i[s visual fascination while divesting it of any unpalatable racial overtones. Yel, comparison of posters for the Revue Negre by Paul Cotin to stills f[Om the fi lmic dance sequence more man suggesrs that bOlh choreographer and cosnune designer fo r rhe robot-Maria were well familia r with Joseplune Baker (Fig. 7).~ Paul Colin, Fritz Lang, Mm()~/is. 1927 Eyp/ian-like Danan, 1927 Fig. 7a - Paul Colin posters and MttrDpclil suUs. 84 roros on German SII/diu Fritz Lang, Metrope/is, 1927 Paul Colin, Utili/ltd, 1927 Fig. 7b - Paul Colin posters and Metropolis stills. Though Lang's apparent stylistic appropriation of a black cultural an form may seem audaci(>us, the mentality behind me: gesture does nor seem (0 have been unique: "Aber da man in Europa den Neger haup[sachlic.h als den Jazzmusikanten kenm und einschatzt, obwahl dec Jazz eine ducchaus 'weiBe' Sache ist, schadet es vieUeicht nichts, das urspcungliche Verhalten des Negers kennenzulernen, und wie er sieh in die Nature einfiigt" (Heuser 840). Po li ti cal One final discursive thread woven thwugh Metropolis must be followed. In doing so, the purpose is not to suggest that Fritz Lang \V'AS somehow a racist. Nevertheless, he clearly drew upon several aeHhetic and ethnographic discourses then circulating, consciously Colonialist Fantasies in MetTopom 85 or not, to construCl the robot-M.aria debut scene. It would be remiss of any investigator to overlook ceruin parallels between the layout and subsequent transformation of that scene and contemporaneous policlcal discussions about the fate o f blacks and their mL\:ed-race children in Germany. Blacks en tered German territOry en maJJe for the first rime during World \'(Jar 1. Most of them were members of French African colonies who remained in Germany aner the end of the war, occupying the Rhineland. 1o By virrue of the French victory, some of these b lack soldiers exercised positions of authoriry, while many procured German wives for themselves. Both of these conditions fostered resentmem among Germans, whether liberal or conservative. Tn terms reminiscent of Nazi rhetoric, the German state "described black soldiers as rapists of German women and ca rriers of venereal and other diseases" (Kesuing 87). The very existence of so-called " Rhineland Bastards," children of imerracial couples, proved so distu rbing CO some Ge rmans (hat by 1927, the same year in which MetropoliJ was released, the Bavarian tvlinis((y of Interior recommended dleir forced sterili:.r.ation, tbough "the suggestion was turned down at the Reich level, because of rhe demo raliZing effects upon the children's mothers" (ibid,), almOSI exclusively white German women. Hille[ continued this inflammatory discourse in /I'[ein Kampf, also published in 1927, singling OUI blacks as agents of racial contamination: " It was and it is Jews who b£ing the Negroes into rhe Rhineland, always with rhe same secrer thought and clear aim of ruining the hated white race by rhe necessarily resulting bastardization , throwing it down from its culrural and politicaJ height, and himself rising to be its master" (325). Even more lellingly for the present purpose, Hitler frames his racia l argument in theological terms. Thus, it would be "positively a sin against aU reason" to assume thac through education and lnlining blacks could attain equality with whites, a furthe r "sin against the will of the E ternal Creator if His most gifted beings" degenerate while "Hottentots and Zulu Kaffirs are u:ained for intellectual professions" (430). One recalls that Lang films two parallel versions of tbe debut scene. In lhe second, the semi-nude black men supponing the robOl­ r-.hria are replaced by animated Statues of the seven deadly sins. 86 Focus Oll German Studies The substitution, while somewhat more faithful to the Scripnlcal sQutce,ll visually equates the blacks with the excesses o f sin and degradation threatening to bring down the futuristic metropolis of New Babylon. Precisely here, where it intersects temporally and thematically with Hicler's rhetoric of imrninent racial and national doom, does the debut scene acquire its most disturbing aspect. University of California, Berkelry Notes ! Henceforward all references [0 Metrop<11ll will be lO the 2002 digit:al reStOration by Martin Koerber of the Friedrich-Wilhelm Murnau Sciftung, available in DVD format from Kino InternationaL 2 Thomas Elsaesscr also observes a n umber of contemporaneous visual panilleis across media, !loring due Lang's Metropolis was designed to have a "recognition factor that made contact with different kinds of eulmnl memory as well as stir deep-rooted fantasies" (20). He does not, however, pursue the mesis tllat one of these "deep-rooted fantasies" may very well have been colonialist. Eisaesser in turn draws upon visual connections made by Heide Schonemaml in Fritz Lang: Filmbilder Vocbilder. Yet, Schanemann concentrates upon uneanhing certain aesthetic and stylistic trends from which Lang drew, without placing her examples within a colonialist discourse_ 3 No!: does such attendance seem to have been unusual: "Diese eeste Nubierexpedition und eine noch graBeee des folgenden Sommers bilden eigentlich ein zusammenhangendes Games_ Jedesma! begann die Aus[cllung in Hamburg und bereiste von hier aus verschiedene Stadte, iiberal.l das gleiche Aufsehen enegend" (Hagenbeck 84). 4 Ak xander Sokolowsky, assistant to Carl Hagenbeck, expresses this relationship explicitly when he writes: "Der Anblick und die Vertiefung in das Leben und Treiben primitiver Volker, die Erwerbung von Kenntnissen auf dem Gebiere der Valkerkunde steigem daher nicht nur unseren Schatz von Kennrrussen, sondern bewirken auch, daB wir in allfgekEirrer und versrandnisvollerer Weise den Vorgangen im Volkerleben auf unserer Erde gegeniiberstehen" (157-8). 5 This tendency of early German ethnographic films (or of their reception) to project authenticity and colonialist con(("Ol may also be seen in Lang's Die Spimlm (1919). As Paui.ck l\kGilligan observes: "The I ncall sets were constructed on [he grounds of Hamburg'S well-known Hagenbeck Zoological Carden, a private zoo auanged pardy in a Chinese style. The C olonialist Fantasies in Metropolis 87 arrangements were made by Heinrich Umlauff, curator of an ethnographic museum and an acquaintance of the director, who inaugurated the tradition of having an 'expert' broughl in to consult on a Fritz Lang film" (58). Umlauff, in rum, was Carl Hagen beck's brother-in-law. 6 TillS is also captured by Count Harry Kessler in his diary enuy of February 24, 1926. describing the jazz dancer Josephine Baker: "Was bei [Oscar] Fried hilRos war, wurde bei ihr grolkr Sill, Ur-Groteske, Figur, die die Mitte hielt zwischen agyptischen Reliefstreifcn und mechanisierter Puppe von Georg Grosz" (461). 7 Thomas Elsaesser also notes this antecedent use of the pedestal support image (20), though without pursuing the colonialist implications_ 8 Indeed, Count Kessler describes several encounters with Baker. His diary entry o f February 13, 1926, contains almost all of me e\emems - female nudity, men in tuxedos, wild choreography, the highly-sought aroma of depravity - found in the robot-r>.hria's debut scene: "Urn eins, nachdetn gerade meine CaSte gegangen waren, rief Max Reinhardt an, er sei bei Vollmoeller, sie baten oUch beide. ob ich nicht noch hinkommen konnc? Mill Baker SCI da, und nun solleen noch fabe lhafte Dinge gemacht werden Ich fuhr also zu Vollmoeller in scinen Harem am Parise! Platz und fand don aufler Reinhardt und Huldsch.insky zwischen einern halben Dutzend nackter Madchen auch Mill Baker, ebenfaUs bis auf cinen rosa Mullschur..: vollig nacke, und die kleine Landshoff (cine Niclue von Sammy Fischer) als Junge im Smoking. Die Baker tanne mit au!1erster Groteskkunsl und Stilreinheit, wie cine agyptische odcr archaische Figur, die : .... krobarik ueibe, ohne jc aus ihrem Scit herauszufallen. $0 miissen die Tanzerinnen Salomos und Tut-eneh-Amuns getanzt haben. Sie tut das swndenlang schcinbar ohne Ermiidung, immer neue Figurcn ertlndend wie im Spiel, wie ein gllickliches Kind. Sie \I>ird dabei [llche einmal warm, sondern behalt cine frische, ki.ihlc. lloekene Haut Ein oezauberndcs Wesen, aber ganz unerotiseh. Man dcnkt bei ihr an Erotik ebensowenig wie bei einem schonen Raubtier. D ie nackten Madchell lagen oder lanzelten zwischen den vier oder runf Herren im Smoking herum, und die kleine Landshoff, die wirkJjch wie ein bildschoner Junge aussieht, tanzte mit der Baker modeme Ja:atimze zurn Grammophon. Vollmoeller wollee file die Baker cin Dallet schreibcn, das er !loch ill diC5cr Nacht fcrcig..:umachen und Reinhardt zu geben vorhane Eine Kokotten-gcschichte. Zwischen Reinhardt, Vollmoeller und mir, die darum herum standen, lagen die Baker und die Landshoff wie ein junges, bildschones Liebespaar umschlungen. Ich sagte: ich wiirde fur sic cine Pantomime nach den J\[otiven des Hohen Liedes Salomonis schreiben, die Baker als Sulamith, die Landshoff im Kosrum (oder Nicht-Kostlim) oriemalisch ;mtik, Salomo im Smoking, eine gam willkiirliche modern­ antike Phantasic nach halh Jazz-, halb orientalischer Musik, vielleicht von 88 FtKUJ on Gem/an Sllidiu R-ichard Strauss" (455-6). Besides its historical value, the passage also possesses a certain psychological interest. Note Kessler's initial fascination with Baket's nudity and dancing, a feeling of arousal quickly denied by his assessment o f her figu re as "ganz unerotisch." As if to confine Baker, to impose upon her limits familiar to him, Kessler ru-;ce invokes the name of Solomon, thereby conjuring images of oric:mal(ist) lusL 9 Filming of Mltropohi ended on October 30, 1926, at least eight months afler Josephine Baker had performed in Berlin. 10 They were often sem first into battle to frighten [he enemy by t.heir skin­ color and presumed fierceness, a practice reenacted in Werner Herzog's conquistador drama, Aguirre. dec Zorn Ganes (1972). II Rev. 17;3-6: ''There: I saw a woman sitcing on a scarlet beast that was covered with blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. T he woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and was glittering wilh gold, precious Stones and Pl=ads. She held :.Ii golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things and the /iILh of her adulteries. This tiue was written on her forehead: r-.1YSTERY BABYLON T HE GREAT T HE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTES AND OF THE ABOr-.nNA110NS OF TI-IE EART H. I saw that the woman was drunk wi.th the blood of the saints, Ule blood of those .. vho bore [cscimony to Jesus." \'(/orks Cited Bhabha, Homi K. The UKanqn of Clllml? London: Rouuedge, 199~. Cochey, Raymond. "Elhnographic Showcases, 1870- 1930." CII/Ilira/ Al:tbropology. 8.3 (1993): 338-369. D,r Qlltmbnift. NendeJn/Lieciuenstein: Kraus Reprint, 1970. (Orig.: Berlin: Propyliien, 1922/23/24/26) Dr. Mabust, dtr Spitl,r. Oir. Fritz Lang. Perf. Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Aud Egede Nissen, and Alfred Abel. Deda-Bioscop, 1922. Eisaesscr, Thomas.. Mllropo/is. Lollclon: BFT,2000. Hagenbeck, Carl. Von Timn lind Mens(hen. Berlin: Vita Deutsches Verlagshaus, 1909. Heuser, Kun. ''Vom afrikanischen Neger." Die 11(111 RIII/diChal/. 6 (1930): 834-84-t Hitler, Adolf. Alein Kampf TrailS. Ralph Manheim. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971. Kessler, Harry Graf. Tagthikbtr 1918-1937. Frankfurt/Main: Insel, 1961. Kestling, Roben \XI. «Blacks Under the Swastika: A Resea[ch Note." The JOllrnolof Ntgro His~ry. 83.1 ( 1998): 84-99. Colonialist Fantasies in Mtlropolis 89 McGilligan, Pauick. Fritz Lfing: The Nallll? of 1m Bta.II. New York: St. Maron's Press, 1997. Metropolis. Oir. Fritz Lang. Perf. Brigitte Helm, Gustav Frohlich, and Rudolph Klci.n~Roggc. Friednch-Willle1.m / .... Iurnau Sti frung, 1927. (2002 digital rcstora tion by Marlin Koerber) Minden, r·d.ichael and Holger Bachmann, eds. Fritz LII!g~ Muropo5s: Cintmotl( Visions of Tuhno/og'J and hoar. Rochester: Camden I-\ouse, 2000. Dit NiiNiNngm: Sio/Jrieds Tod. Oir. Fntz Lang. Pcrf. Paul Richter, Margarete Schoen. Friedrich-Wilhelm Murnau Sliftung, 1924. Oksiloff, Assenka. Pi(luring the Primilillf: Vislla! Cllllllrt, Ethnograpl?J, allli Barty Gerfl/Iln Cinw/(l. New York: Pa[grave, 2001. Rony, Falimah -robing. The Third by: Raft, Cinllflll, (JlId Etlmograpbk Sputack. Durham: Duke UP, 1996. Schonemann, Heide. rntz Ll!Ig: Fllmblkkr Vorbikltr. Berlin: i-Jcntrich, 1992... $immei, Georg. "The Metropolis and Menr:al Life." The Sodo/og] of Georg SimmeL Trans.. Kurt \'('olf[ New York: Free Press, 1950: 409-424. Sokolowsky, AlexandeL Carl I-Iagtllbttk lind uin [Perk. Leipzig: E. Haberland, 1928.