From the 1926 Secrets of a Soul he developed a close and continuous partnership with Georg Wilhelm Pabst.
His most important work is probably the 1928 short film Polizeibericht Überfall ("Police Report: Hold-Up", known in English as "Accident").
Metzner both wrote and directed this landmark of the New Objectivity movement in film, banned by authorities as "brutalizing and demoralizing."
As a Hungarian Jew,[1] in 1933 Metzner emigrated from Germany to France and then to England, where he reunited with Austrian director Friedrich Feher.
From 1936 Metzner moved with his family to the United States, but found only occasional work in Hollywood.