Has anyone mentioned Metropolis yet? Perhaps more industrial/futuristic looking than Steampunky but I think there are elements within it.
I finally got to see Metropolis last week. I had decided there was absolutely nothing on satellite TV one night, when I noticed that a French language public TV channel was showing
Metropolis. So, I watched it -- with the original German intertitles, subtitled in French. (My ability to read and translate both languages simultaneously was not quite up to the speed with which the titles disappeared, but I managed to get the gist of the story from the French anyway.)
I thought there were some really wonderful visual images, especially of "the machine" and the robot, although I had already seen most of these images in clips and stills.
The story was rather muddled, though, and there were some rather long, tedious scenes of the actors simply "emoting" in the stereotypical manner of silent films.
I was really taken with Rotwang, though. He seems to have been the archetype of the Mad Scientist for so many later films. [Indeed, I think John Lithgow's Dr. Lizardo/Lord Wharfin in Buckaroo Banzai was an homage to this archetype.]
Rotwang:
Lizardo/Wharfin:
