“In the late 1920s, all the most exciting pictures were made in Germany, many of them by Mr. Lang. He liked his women fatal and processed his actresses to fit this ideal. His greatest discovery was Miss Helm, whom he put into Metropolis, the first science-fiction movie ever made. In this movie, the usual mad scientist captures her and with some rather glib use of electricity makes a robot in her likeness, except that the chromium Miss Helm has no soul and one eye never shuts.
In the original version of this story, the robot does a pseudo-Egyptian dance, but this episode was cut from later copies, presumably because it was thought too shocking. An alternative sequence was substituted, which, in fact, was infinitely more perverse. An entirely male audience is seen staring intently at some silver theater curtains. Suddenly, Miss Helm insinuates herself between the curtains. She is wearing a black satin dress that reaches up to her ears, down to her knuckles, and trails along the ground behind her. She divides the slit in her skirt just enough to reveal one thigh, from which she snatches a diamente garter, which, with a darting cobralike movement, she flings at her audience. At once, a forest of hands springs up to catch it and the sequence is over. In all, it cannot have lasted more than a minute, but its impact was unforgettable. At that moment, Miss Helm looked like a large spider that had been dipped in melted sugar. I cannot imagine anything more alluring. (Quentin Crisp, How to go to the movies, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1989.)