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Science Fiction & Ideas & Movies Posted by James Killus, 20 Aug 2007 06:21 am

Metropolis

I know a lot of amateur scholars, including myself (ask me about New York City circa 1911 sometime). Many of them concentrate a fair amount of their scholarly impulses on science fiction, and that includes my friend Douglas. He’s taken advantage of the fact that U.C. Berkeley has a collection of the papers of A.E. van Vogt, for example. He also tells me of a movie review of Metropolis written by H. G. Wells.

Wells was highly critical of the movie, on science fiction and futurist terms. Specifically, Wells noted that the economics of Metropolis was simply non-functional. In the city, there is a small, wealthy class that owns everything, while there is a much larger class (literally an underclass, because they live in the city’s depths) of workers who produce all the goods. Nonsense, says Wells. This makes no sense. The number of workers, plus modern manufacturing, would produce vastly more goods than the small wealthy class can consume. Who buys the rest of it?

There are a couple of points worth noting here. One is that the society in Metropolis is very similar to Wells’ own book When the Sleeper Wakes, written 25 years before Metropolis. The second is that Wells belonged to the Bloomsbury Group, a collection of artists, writers, and other intellectuals, that included John Maynard Keynes. I suspect that Keynes once made the same economic critique to Wells, about Sleeper. Wells then passed it on.

It’s a relevant point, and quite true. Yet the image of the elite in the clouds while the toilers work in darkness nevertheless is the one that sticks in the mind. It’s way too easy to make the leap to Freudian symbolism here, even down to the parsing the phrases “bowels of the city” or “out of sight, out of mind.”

Can one even find a dystopian future story that doesn’t contain the extremes in wealth and power trope? Harrison Bergeron by Vonnegut comes to mind, since it, at least on the surface, was about forcing everyone to the same level. But scratch the surface and there’s the Handicapper General wielding power over everyone. Maybe that Twilight Zone where everyone has plastic surgery to look the same manages it.

For that matter, the highly unequal version of society isn’t confined to obviously dystopian works. Often it seems like the standard view of what’s to come, as if no one can really come up with a credible alternative.

If science fiction is a reflection of everyone’s hopes and fears about the future (and that’s surely one feature of our genre), what does it say that everyone has in the back of their mind a view of an undemocratic, faux feudal society, with the masses falling prey to a few predatory rulers? And if this vision of the future is the default, it certainly makes sense for people to engage in class warfare as a sort of full contact musical chairs, with the expectation that the winners and their progeny will have the rest of time to enjoy the spoils of the Social Darwinian State.

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Responses to “Metropolis”

1. on 20 Aug 2007 at 6:49 am 1. christian h. said …

   James, thanks for the post. I think you make a good point. I’d say, though, that Science Fiction is also a reflection on the present - therefore it’s not so surprising that negative portrayals of the future depict an exaggerated version of what people generally dislike about the present, e.g., the class structure of society (in the case of Metropolis).

2. on 20 Aug 2007 at 9:39 am 2. Kiera PSI said …

   I’m not so sure it’s all that exaggerated at this point. Very depressing, especially as I’m definitely in the underclass, even though I produce no goods.

3. on 20 Aug 2007 at 9:55 am 3. James Killus said …

   christian,
   I tend to go further than that: science fiction is always about the present. There are few things more informative about present culture as its images of the future, and few things are more indicative of a particular time period than the science fiction of the era.

   That said, I don’t know of any time when the class structure of society did not loom large in views of the future. Even (or maybe especially) the works of the old socialist utopians (e.g. Bellamy) give the game away by having the utopias come into being by having everyone just decide that it’s a good idea, sometimes (maybe usually) after a “time of turmoil.” Because, well, there’s nothing like turmoil to make people abandon authoritarian philosophies and work for the greater good.

4. on 20 Aug 2007 at 9:55 am 4. Arnaud said …

   It’s been a while since I read it, but while Stand on Zanzibar definitly describes an inegalitarian society, it doesn’t seem to be the defining aspect of Brunner’s dystopia.
   That may be it, though: the focus in our society is very much on individual liberties as a positive. When we describe a “feudal” future, it is not as much a place where economic inequalities reign as much as one where we lose control over our destiny. (For economic reasons, OK, but there are only that many types of militaristic/fascist societies you can imagine*)
   The Russians were quite keen on SF for a while, I wonder what a soviet dystopia would have looked like.

   Arnaud

   *What about Starship Troopers? Would you call it a dystopia?

5. on 20 Aug 2007 at 10:08 am 5. James Killus said …

   Brunner’s The Sheep Look Up is closer to a class stratified distopia. Zanzibar was primarily about overpopulation, though the rich/poor divide among nations was a major feature.

   I imagine a Soviet era dystopian future would look a lot like Russia does now.

   Starship Troopers depicted a society in perpetual war. The movie got the distopian aspects of it, humorously enough (and the science fiction fans hated it, though I’m not sure how they’d have felt if the protagonist were black, as he more or less is in the book).

   Heinlein’s philosophy stated fairly explicitly that the highest form of individualism was military service. He was also a Social Darwinist. He was a cracking good storyteller, and people tend to fall for a well told story.

6. on 20 Aug 2007 at 11:01 am 6. christian h. said …

   I plugged Ken MacLeod here before - I think he’s someone who produces “realistic” future societies. Some of them are socialist or otherwise non-capitalist, but they aren’t utopian and perfect; and they didn’t get so magically (like the Star Trek universe, as a particularly egregious example of “and then we all decided it was a good idea”). What about Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy?

   By the way, I agree that Science Fiction is always about the present, and I also think it often can be and has been used to deconstruct the present in much more radical ways than contemporary fiction can. Much of the SciFi produced under Stalinist regimes comes to mind - Stanislav Lem could write what “realist” fiction writers couldn’t. But it also works in capitalist societies without overt censorship as a way to bypass entrenched ideological preconceptions in the readers’ minds.

   I’ve always thought Heinlein in general, and Starship Troopers in particular, to be borderline fascist (and I try not to bandy that term about lightly).

7. on 20 Aug 2007 at 12:06 pm 7. Arnaud said …

   I don’t know if Ken Macleod would be very happy to be described as a socialist…
   I really liked The Cassini Division and to a lesser extent The Stone Canal which he himself describes as having for theme the collapse of socialists and the “persistence of revolutionnary politics”. Some of his other stuff I found less convincing (I bought 2 copies of Newton’s Wake because I couldn’t remember reading it the first time!) but you are right in that, in the The Fall Revolution series, he describes convincing future and alternative societies. Convincing in the sense that they are still dynamic and not a perfect unmoving utopia.
   As for Science Fiction being always about the present; well, it’s a cliche, isn’t it? Sometimes cliches become so for a reason but I am a bit concerned by this “always”. I am afraid you mean by that the best SF, i.e. the one you like. Nothing wrong with that but SF is also an escapist genre and I don’t see much of that preoccupation with the present among relatively new writers like China Mieville or (dare I name him?) Neal Asher.
   I wouldn’t say that it’s Ken Macleod dominant trait either.
   Still, this obsession with the present could well be the main reason (more even than the progress of science and technology) why paradoxaly SF books often age so fast and so badly. The preoccupation of an era often don’t survive that long.
   Stand on Zanzibar goes a bit beyond that; in my opinion it’s more about human nature and specifically the animality of human nature. But then, I am quite a big fan…

8. on 20 Aug 2007 at 12:16 pm 8. christian h. said …

   I don’t think I said MacLeod is a socialist (his politics are clearly radical, but I don’t know specifically what kind - anarcho-syndicalist, maybe?), only that some of the societies he describes are.

   And yes, there is escapism in Science Fiction, too - absolutely correct; and that’s not necessarily a bad thing, I didn’t mean to suggest it is.

9. on 20 Aug 2007 at 1:13 pm 9. Oaktown Girl said …

   James: Because, well, there’s nothing like turmoil to make people abandon authoritarian philosophies and work for the greater good.

   Ha! *snort!*

   I think indeed the key to achieving a better future is being able to visualize one, and I don’t believe that we are short on good visions. One of the problems, however, (among the many), is that when people do stick their necks out to share these visions, they usually get shot down in a hurry. Almost everyone’s racing to say why it can’t work instead of thinking, even for a moment, about how it can work.

   As for sci fi writing, I guess it’s just easier to write about stories based on power struggles. And power, as we know it, usually is controlled by whoever’s got the purse strings.

10. on 20 Aug 2007 at 1:22 pm 10. Arnaud said …

    Did I seem a bit aggressive in my last post? Sorry for that if it was the case!
    No, my point is: not all SF is concerned with the present (hence the reference to escapism). Actually, in my opinion it was only ever the case of a small faction within the genre. A lot of SF, and definitly a lot of classic SF, is apolitical or right wing. The writers of the 40s and 50s were more influenced by technology or science than politics. And when somebody like Van Vogt risked himself into that field it was with a certain, erm… engaging naivety! (Was it The Children of Tomorrow dealing with anarchy? Quite funny: Old Alfred E had a tendency to deal with political theories as he would with any scientific theories)
    But that doesn’t mean the writers of that time weren’t dealing with utopia/dystopia. Just that when they did it, it was most of the time scientific utopias.
    We at first glance seem to have lost that conviction now, that science will one day sort out all our problems, but it’s not entirely true: an example of scientific utopia is easily found in Iain Banks’ Culture, a technical (well, magico-technological!) dystopia in Mieville’s New Crozubon, which I class as SF. These writers have little to tell us about our time (unless they choose explicitly to do so) but they are still among the best SF has to offer. So I don’t really know if, as you said, Science Fiction is always about the present .

    PS: Funny thing about Heinlein, I never really liked him. But I loved Starship Troopers, bad politics and all!

11. on 20 Aug 2007 at 1:41 pm 11. James Killus said …

    I think that escapist literature is clearly about the present; that is what the escapist is escaping from.

    As for Heinlein, it’s easy to see how a military man can do a quick do-si-do into fascism, but I’m more inclined to think of it as a result of his Social Darwinism, which, in turn, was a product of both his times, and his ignorance of actual science.

    I used to hold the standard opinion that science is basically amoral and it’s the uses to which it’s put that hold the moral aspects. But on much further reflection, I think that science provides a backbone to a worldview, and also that science is an invention, in and of itself. So a “scientific” worldview can carry moral implications, and it’s important to pay attention to how the science is formulated, presented, and structured, and what sorts of moral conclusions might, rightly or wrongly, be drawn from any given theory. And evolutionary theory is one of the most dangerous for amateurs to work with. Economics is another. Heinlein fiddled around with both, and got much of it wrong. But then, so do most authors.

    Oaktown Girl, the actual go-to formulation in science fiction is known as the “adolescent power fantasy.”

12. on 20 Aug 2007 at 2:00 pm 12. Bill Benzon said …

    And then there’s the question of the Star Trek world vs. the Star WarsM world. Is it really democracy vs. mystico-authoritarianism, as has been argued hither and yon.

13. on 20 Aug 2007 at 2:22 pm 13. Oaktown Girl said …

    Oaktown Girl, the actual go-to formulation in science fiction is known as the “adolescent power fantasy.”

    I’m not sure exactly what that means, but based on just the name of it, I could take an educated guess at two likely meanings.

    In any event, the name of it calls to mind the Bush/Cheney (Neocon) go-to formula. (I don’t know if there are any similarities or not).

14. on 20 Aug 2007 at 2:26 pm 14. Arnaud said …

    James Killus:

    I think that escapist literature is clearly about the present; that is what the escapist is escaping from.

    Was that a sophism, sir? I haven’t seen one of them for a long time! ;¬)

15. on 20 Aug 2007 at 2:31 pm 15. christian h. said …

    My impression of forties and fifties science fiction - and I’m not an expert, I had never even heard of Van Vogt before this post, for example (I think - I might have read a short story by him and not recall it) - has always been that it was very much concerned with the implications of the atomic age. Maybe technological implications more than political ones, to be sure, but still.

    Oaktown Girl, I think you hit the nail on the head about Cheney’s go-to formula.

16. on 20 Aug 2007 at 3:02 pm 16. James Killus said …

    Oaktown Girl,
    I believe that the “adolescent power fantasy” is distinguished from the “infantile power fantasy.” The former is characterized by wish fulfillment fantasies leading to high social acceptance and status. The latter is pretty much, “Hulk angry! Hulk Smash!”

    So I’d say that adolescent power fantasies would be an improvement for the Bush/Cheney crowd.

    Arnaud,
    Sophistry, from moi? Ah, the sophists were unfairly maligned.

    However, no, not if you’re thinking that what I was saying was tautological or otherwise without content. Escapist literature carries with it the lingering scent of the here-and-now. Once westerns were popular escapist fair; now they aren’t. I do not think it simply a matter of fadishness. Horror was at one time practically extinct; now it dominates. So we’ve traded rustlers for vampires. I suspect that means something.

    In science fiction, the “planetary colonization” story has become quite rare, Kim Stanley Robinson notwithstanding. Instead, we get galactic space operas, and interstellar colonies. I’d like to know why.

    I’ve been writing a series of, oh, I don’t know, call them “deconstructionist retro-reviews,” including one of Slan and a more recent (and related) one of Atlas Shrugged, (which I insist is science fiction; see comment about adolescent power fantasy above). Given the eclipse of Freud by pop pseudo-psychology, I think this is a wide open field.

17. on 20 Aug 2007 at 3:54 pm 17. Seattle said …

    I happen to have a copy of Ken Macleod’s “Newton’s Wake” here at my desk because a co-worker recommended it. I got maybe 150 pages into it and put it down with no particular desire to finish it. Characters that are focussed primarily on themselves don’t hold my interest. Distopian societies in and of themselves with no central character to latch onto emotionally seems like a waste of intellectual time.

    Many years ago I read a lot of CJ Cheryh. I started with her “Faded Sun” trilogy which I actually like quite a bit even though it definitely wasn’t a happy story in any way shape or form. Then I read “Cyteen” which left me pretty cold-something I found to be a common factor in her universes-lack of emotional connection between humans. I far prefer Lois McMaster Bujold BECAUSE there is such a focus on relationships and society and the effects of environment on society, isolation on society, etc. Her societies aren’t perfect and the sneaking love of aristocracy does ooze in, but always with a sense of humor; if you’re the son of the leader of a planet that worships physical perfection due to the high number of mutations early in the planet’s history and you happen to be deformed, how do you handle it? How do people handle you? That’s the kind of sociological question that I like to read about.

    As far as Heinlein goes, I read all his stuff in my early teens and I was done with that. I still like to revisit “Have Space Ship Will Travel” because it is SO 1950’s, but I never actually read “Starship Troopers.” Clarke was all science, no relationships of depth.

    I really feel that a lot of SF that I’ve picked up in the last 15 or more years holds such a negative view of the future that I was more depressed after I read it. So I gave up my subscription to Asimov’s magazine and I tiptoe through the SF section in the bookstores…

18. on 20 Aug 2007 at 5:05 pm 18. Zeus said …

    Indeed, let’s here it for the female science fiction (or more accurately “speculative fiction”) writers. I think the social angle is far more interesting and “realistic” and therefore informative (as well as entertaining) than the technotopia and armageddon angle which seems favored by the dude authors.

    A couple of my favorites “The Left Hand of Darkness” by Ursula Le Guin, one of the better attempts to sketch out a plausible Utopia, albeit with warts, and one of the best satirical descriptions of academic culture on page 67 or so, if I recall. What I like, and I see this in terms of scientific discussions on the future of “intelligence”, is a focus on the far more accessible and quantumly possible area of innovation of social relations instead of simple innovation of technology. By the same token, I think the far more interesting work in increasing intelligence lies not in the cognitive and “artificially intelligent” machines, but in our own progress beyond our emotional and social limitations.

    The other book of note, the dystopia, is “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood, which again throws out there for consideration what happens when some particularly nasty elements of patriarchal thought extend themselves and attempt to insert themselves in the running of society. The movie actually ain’t bad either, if you haven’t time for the novel, but it is a fairly quick read and a great book.

    Citizen Zeus

19. on 20 Aug 2007 at 5:58 pm 19. James Killus said …

    From the comments, I probably shouldn’t mention that I wrote a story with no characters whatsoever, huh?

20. on 20 Aug 2007 at 6:01 pm 20. Arnaud said …

    James,
    Allen Steele’s Coyote series is a good example of current “planetary colonization” stories. Not that I would necessarily call it a distinct sub-genre. For me it’s very much space-opera. Cow-boys in space, in other words; one trade the “sonic death ray” for the six-shooters, the other the bug-eyed monster for the red-skin. I’ll agree that a lot of modern SF is not that clear-cut but, on the other hand, I am sure all westerns weren’t that simplistic either.
    All in all, I suspect it doesn’t mean much. We all bring our own experience to the reading of a book, in that sense every artistic creation speak of the present. I have always been very sceptical of these affirmations that an author speaks to us through the centuries. We certainly cannot read Homer the way he was meant to be read.
    Your reading of Slan as wish-fulfilment for smart but uneducated working-class boys is spot-on though. The funny thing is: the definition perfectly applies to Van Vogt. He was not only writing for this demographic, he was also part of it. In my opinion, it was a big part of his appeal: he was a good storyteller and the fiction (and the ideas) were more important to him than the science, which, as you point out, he didn’t really understand (he was scientifically illiterate). SF is all about suspension of disbelief and Van Vogt was always good at that, good at making his reader check in their critical faculties at the door for just long enough to get on with the story. So yeah the science didn’t had up (I seem to recall he was awfully fond of the word “energy” as in “The energies employed were colossal!”) and the political awareness wasn’t all there (as noted above) and his plots were both terribly complicated and full of holes, but all in all it never really mattered to me that much. I probably fit well in that demographic too…
    Seattle : “if you’re the son of the leader of a planet that worships physical perfection due to the high number of mutations early in the planet’s history and you happen to be deformed, how do you handle it?” That’s Empire of the Atom, another one from Mr Van Vogt! I told you the guy was a genius!
    Zeus, you may want to try Grass by Sherry Tepper, she is a bit too prolific and not always excellent but that one at least is worth reading. Margaret Atwood, though, if I also may insist, does not write science-fiction…

21. on 20 Aug 2007 at 6:12 pm 21. Bill Benzon said …

    Let’s extend this discussion in a different direction, from Metropolis itself. During WWII a young Japanese medical student named Osamu Tezuka saw a still from Lang’s film in some movie magazine; it seems to have been an image of the robot being energized though the scifi gizmo attached to the girl. The picture stuck in his mind and he wrote and published a story that was triggered by that memory. It was one of his early mangas and sold several 100K copies. It too was called Metropolis and it was certainly deep into power fantasy territory. But also loss and grief territory. It was a precursor to his Astro Boy series, which was enormously successful (and brought him to the attention of Stanley Kubrick, who asked him to art-direct 2001).

    Early in this century, some years after Tezuka had died, some of his colleagues and admirers decided to make an anime feature based on his early manga. They did and it is a wonderful movie, entitled, of course, Metropolis. This anime film gets significant elements of its scenic design from Lang’s film, including the idea of a central tower and of the proletariat living underground. In this case, however, the proletariat consists of 3 classes of robots and unemployed and disaffected workers.

    The penultimate scene shows the final collapse of the Ziggurat, the central tower. And a splendid apocalyptic scene it is. The real shocker, however, is the sound track, which is filled with Ray Charles singing “I can’t stop loving you.” Made me think of the end of Dr. Strangelove where we hear a sentimental ballad, “We’ll Meet Again,” while the earth blows up in slo-mo.

22. on 20 Aug 2007 at 8:31 pm 22. JP Stormcrow said …

    I have only seen Metropolis once, and that was Giorgio Moroder’s 1984 restored version with rock soundtrack. It was visually and musically stunning, but I must confess that I did not pay a lot of attention to the story.

    In some ways H.G Wells’ The Time Machine took the haves and have-nots to an extreme (and reversed the topside overlord theme). Although I sometimes wonder if that is correct, maybe the Eloi are figuratively as well as literally on top - Live slow, die young and leave a beautiful slab of meat doesn’t sound that bad… Of course it really is the Morlocks who are the “us” in that story. (A theme deeply explored, of course, in the yet-to-be-optioned future cyber-scifi cult classic Triumph of the Snark. Hint, hint to any movie producers or really, really rich people** who might happen to be reading.)

    ** You know, like hedge fund brokers,… we were being morally outraged with you, not at you. Really!

23. on 21 Aug 2007 at 2:48 pm 23. Seattle said …

    The current crop of sci-fi reflects a kind of “it’s all downhill from here” attitude that goes with the current American psyche. We’ve figured out that the dream of the last century-children will be better off than their parents, we’ll all retire at 65 and go tour the country in our recreational vehicles, forever and ever-is not turning out to be viable for the vast majority. And we resent the hell out of it. People with the almighty college degree are working as “admins” and people with high school degrees are spending quality time avoiding their landlords. Parents who treat their kids like crap are beginning to realize they might have to depend on them in their old age. Hmmm.

    For some reason the current crop of writers can’t imagine their way into a future that doesn’t have humans increasingly miserable. William Gibson is another interesting example. I enjoyed “Neuromancer” and “Count Zero” and the short story “New Rose Hotel” gets me everytime.
    http://www.voidspace.org.uk/cyberpunk/burning_chrome.shtml#newrose
    Humans living on the cast-offs of the past while a technological elite lives in corporate enclaves and the underworld is about data and technology theft.

24. on 21 Aug 2007 at 4:05 pm 24. James Killus said …

    I occurs to me that I would be remiss if I did not, amidst a discussion of current science fiction, direct people’s attention to Helix, a science fiction webzine, in which I have appeared (and will again). Helix is an attempt at a “reader supported” web business model, with its entire income coming from its tip jar.

    I will note that it does not seem to me like current SF is entirely lost in “everything is ruined,” attitudes, though, of course, some of the optimism may seem forced. Really thinking about the future is inevitably a bit depressing, since that is where all our deaths occur. Nevertheless, one summons the courage to bite off at least another day, or year, or decade. Imagination allows us to masticate entire millenia, albeit without subsequent digestion, the meal being, well, imaginary.

25. on 21 Aug 2007 at 4:24 pm 25. Seattle said …

    “Really thinking about the future is inevitably a bit depressing, since that is where all our deaths occur.”

    I can’t agree. The future is where our future is. Personal and species future. Focus on personal death is living with blinders on-another very American trait. Where will we be in five thousand years and what are we doing now to get there? Americans don’t think like that. We’re glued to the short term, personal goal. But imagine humans five thousand years from today. Where will we be and what will we be like? What would we like to be like? The planet will definitely be here, short of some form of galactic disaster and I don’t believe we’re due for another planet crashing into us. GNF aside, global climate change aside, what will we be doing?

26. on 21 Aug 2007 at 4:26 pm 26. Seattle said …

    In other words, NOT assuming that we’re inevitably a species out of control without hope, what might we become?

27. on 21 Aug 2007 at 5:03 pm 27. christian h. said …

    GNF aside,

    Heresy!

28. on 21 Aug 2007 at 5:31 pm 28. James Killus said …

    You know, Seattle, I didn’t say that one shouldn’t think about all the nifty stuff that will take place in the future. But if you don’t find the thought of missing all that nifty stuff (”I don’t wanna go to bed, Mommy, the party is still going on!”) a little depressing, then you’re either missing part of the picture, or you have better meds than I do.

    But, as cristian reminds me, a lot of people find the thought of everybody all dying at once downright exhilirating.

    They say this universe is bound to blow
    But I say we crank up the calypso control
    Apocalyp, apocalyp, apocalypso

    Now I’m no dancer as dancers go
    But this is one step that you need to know
    Apocalyp, apocalyp, apocalypso
    We’ll be dancing when we go

    Planets come and planets go
    Apocalypso
    Undisturbed the dancers flow
    Apocalypso
    Old galaxies can be cold
    So I’ll hold you close
    When this earthly light is burning low
    This dance will take you to the next plateau

    Apocalyp, apocalyp, apocalypso
    We’ll be dancing when we go
    We’ll be dancing when we go

    Planets come and planets go
    Apocalypso
    Undisturbed the dancers flow
    Apocalypso

    Yes we’ll ride that final tide
    Apocalypso
    Gone away just yesterday
    Apocalypso

    “Apocalypso” — Jimmy Buffett

29. on 22 Aug 2007 at 8:19 am 29. Seattle said …

    LOL There is a difference between missing part of the picture and dwelling on the shadows in the picture in denial of the light. And I don’t take any meds-not even for pain. Imagine that…how un-American.

    What if we decided to graft tree bark genes into humans to combat increased radiation levels? Just a thought I had on the way home last night.

    Another book I thought really stepped outside the space opera genre was “The Color of Distance” by Amy Thomson. It’s not a book I’ll reread on a regular basis, but she did an excellent job of creating a truly alien species and it’s a great cross cultural communication read.