Force Fed Films: Metropia (2009)

Today Puneet decided to use my as a guinea pig and told me to watch Metropia which was recommended by @scoobydiesel a little while back. It seemed to have a very weird, but interesting animation style which made it stand out. Such an odd looking movie could be anything, so I really didn't know what to expect, especially since the cover shows his head opening up and a little dude sitting inside it! I really didn't know anything about this movie other than a few screenshots, and I didn't even recognize any of the actor's names. If this strange looking movie intrigues you, I'll give you the insider story on what I found right after the jump!


Roger is just an average, plain, normal guy. He has a mundane job, a mundane little apartment, and even his relationship seems to have become boring to him. It's all because he keeps suspecting conspiracies around him. He thinks his girlfriend's guy friend is trying to steal her away, he thinks the people at his work spy on him, and he thinks there is "something" going on with the subway system so he refuses to take it, only riding his bike to work, which of course keeps him from home much longer. Everybody thinks it's all in his head, but then one day, there actually is something in his head... a voice. He brushes it off at first as his imagination, but when it persists into the next day, and responds to his own thoughts, he begins to take notice!

Roger is bored with his totally normal, nothing special life

So while at first, I thought this film was animated (and I guess it is in a way), it's actually made of live footage of what appear to be real people. Curiously however, no credits are given to the body actors, only the voice actors. One of which is Stellan Skarsgard, who was the middle-aged scientist dude in Thor. Maybe the faces are made up of composites of many faces? I really have no idea. While it looks pretty good/freaky in still images, when it's in motion it sorta jerks and slides around in a strange, not quite human way. It was actually kinda disturbing and creeped me out a number of times. Especially when there are "sexy" moments. I'm sorry, but I don't want to see your strange mutant, misshapen alien bodies naked.

Get used to Roger's face looking like that, it's always like that

Another odd thing about the animation is that we only ever see the characters from either head on, or perfect profile. This means that a lot of the movie actually looks the same since you're staring into the same creepy dead eyes all the time. I'll be honest, there are a few moments when they have different angles to the face, but it's so rare that I remember actually being shocked when suddenly Roger's face is seen from another angle. Most of the time though, he's either just staring off into space with his black pit-of-no-hope eyes, or in profile, where he looked more like an eggplant than a person.

Roger's inner voice is named Stefan, and he gets nervous when Roger won't listen to him

Probably the only saving grace for Metropia is the weird sci-fi story with the voices in the head and the strange future this mutant-variant of the human race lives in. Apparently they used up all the oil and fossil fuels, so they're condemned to use only the train and subway system. A very large company has connected all the subway systems for all of Europe together, eliminating boarders and making the world much more peaceful. Too bad their Earth is perpetually overcast and polluted and they spend most of their time underground in the never ending subway system.

But that's not to say the movie isn't without holes in the story. Ignoring the whole voice in the head bit, why is their world forever dark and grey if there are no more fossil fuels, and it's been so long that an entire generation doesn't know what it was like before? And if there's no more oil or gas, then how is it that they conveniently find a working moped, to get them where they need to go? And no, it's not a weird future moped, there was exhaust coming out of it. I won't even get into the voice thing though, because that would be saying too much.

Stare into the eyes of nothingness

This is a hard movie to show with just pictures. They almost all look the same. But that's just kind of how it is. The eyes look around, they blink, and the mouths are sort of "morphed" open and closed for talking. The bodies seem to just be filmed regular bodies so they move around quite normally. Then you have this really strange, but kinda interesting story about conspiracies and some really weird stretches that you need to make with your imagination to be able to buy anything that's going on. The best thing I can say for certain, is that I've never seen anything like this before, and I probably never will again. It's not a total waste of time, not at all, but I just didn't like the look of the animation. That of course is entirely subjective, and so if you like the kooky look of the film, you might just like it, or maybe even love it. I certainly won't hold it against you, it's definitely original, I'll give it that.

If you've seen Metropia, what did you think about it? Leave me something in the comments!