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This Film Is More Than 100 Years Old

The Flying Train (1902)

The Flying Train is two minutes of documentary footage from the newly opened elevated train system in Wuppertal, Germany, in 1902. It’s just breathtakingly beautiful, and weirdly, impossibly, futuristic, even though it’s 118 years old. And a train.

There’s always something soothing and alluring about watching old footage of city streets recorded from trains, trams and buses or whatever, presumably the lovely unhurried emptiness of the streets, with pedestrians allowed to amble wherever they please, but this footage, I think, might be my favourite ever from that particular genre.

There’s a nice comparison video here, showing this film and some footage filmed from the same track in 2015. You don’t get chickens wandering aimlessly around in the middle of the road in 2015, but apart from that it’s pleasingly similar. But there’s very little that’s soothing about it, due to the cloying claustrophobia of cars.

Also, I don’t know if they have trains like this everywhere in Germany (I’ve never been), but I first saw these in the background of one of the dance scenes in Wim Wenders’ documentary, Pina, a few years ago, and thought even then they looked like something from some unattainable future. I just didn’t know that future was 120 years old.

Who knew Metropolis was a documentary.

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Notes

1. I watched this on youtube here.

2. And I also watched the wonderful comparison video on youtube too.

3. And Although I didn’t watched Pina on youtube, I did find the clip I captured a still from above on there.

4. So hooray for youtube, I suppose.

5. There’s a nice article about The Flying Train film (and some others) here too: This 1902 Footage of a Flying Train Is the Film of the Summer.

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Film Information

Title: The Flying Train
Year: 1902
Watch: youtube
Further Information: This 1902 Footage of a Flying Train Is the Film of the Summer (article; Wuppertal Schwebebahn 1902 & 2015 side by side comparison video