Paris, Texas

Rating:
Summary: A shame it's not available to buy
Review: 5/3/03-I'm editing this review just to add that it is apparently available for sale on VHS (it wasn't when I first wrote this), and this is a very very good thing! I hope now there are plans for a DVD.

Even though you can't buy "Paris, Texas" at the moment, at leastI hope to convince someone to go rent it. It is an equal to Wim Wenders' other and better-known masterpiece, "Wings of Desire," and it was easily one of the best films of the 1980's. It is a simple and beautiful story of a man reunited with his past that he is also trying to escape, and, well, I really can't think of a single thing wrong with it. Some people may find it slow or dull, ...)

"Paris, Texas" contains some of the most beautiful cinematography I've seen in a film, and I only have seen it on video! I will also never forget its many touching scenes, such as when the family watches the filmstrip and ultimately rekindles the relationship between Harry Dean Stanton and his son, the shot of the skyscraper as the son listens to his father's voice on a cassette tape, and the windshield wipers slowly scraping the window during a summer rain. Okay. I'm done being poetic.

The film is also a statement about the alienation of living in the United States. There are many scenes of modern life: skyscrapers, airports, highways, but they are all have this empty and sad feeling about them, rather than the "industrial strength" we usually associate with such things. But, at any rate, this is a far cry from a "message" film. There is no real pat moral or political statment here, just a wonderful and moving experience, also much like "Wings of Desire."

Rent "Paris, Texas" and if you see it used anywhere, buy it. It is about as perfect as a film as you are going to see.

Rating:
Summary: A Brilliant Cinematic Journey
Review: A man wanders aimlessly in the Texan desert as he collapses in a rural bar looking for water. The man is brought to a doctor who finds a phone number in his empty wallet, which he calls in order to find out the identity of the man. The man is Travis (Harry Dean Stanton) and his brother, Walt (Dean Stockwell), comes from California to pick him up as he vanished four years ago and left family behind. Walt is puzzled about Travis's whereabouts for the last four years, but Travis remains silent as he keeps a secret deep within himself. When Travis vanished his wife, Jane (Nastassja Kinski), disappeared after she had left their son in the custody of Walt and his wife.

Paris, Texas is a straight forward story, yet mystifying as it discloses very little for the audience. This is Wim Wenders intention as he directed the film. He wants to coerce the audience to participate cerebrally, and if not the cinematic experience will be lost in time. The bewildering element surrounds Travis and his emotional journey through loss, grief, and love. It is through these emotional states that the story expands, but the tale seems to be fixed in time as the progress is minimal. This simplicity brings about a brilliant cinematic experience, which is enhanced by stunning cinematography and vivid colors as the mirage of the desert heat plays tricks on the mind.

Rating:
Summary: This DVD version is a RIPOFF! DON'T BUY IT! (film spoilers)
Review: Another fine film has been destroyed by making it a FULL SCREEN presentation, with ZERO features, commentaries, etc.
Can you believe that? If any movie needed to be released in Widescreen, this was the one! UN-FRIGGIN-BELIEVABLE!!!

Now, about the movie itself? 5 STARS. I will not try to give too much away, as there are a few minor spoilers here, but please understand, this movie has that rare kind of intensity.
Harry Dean Stanton deserved an Oscar for his performance here as Travis, and we find him at the beginning of the film wandering under the vast open skies and desert under the hot Texas sun alone as he drinks from a small jug of water. A local sheriff finds him, and after questioning him (as Travis doesn't answer), he goes through his clothes and finds a slip of paper with his brother Walt's (Dean Stockwell) number.
Walt comes to get him and we find out that he has been missing for 4 years. He takes Travis back to LA with him where we now see his 7 year old son Hunter, who was abandoned there by Travis' wife, is curious to know who he is.
We find Travis is a disaster, and emotionally vacant, to everyone, and even Hunter. The film takes us on an emotional downslide as the mysteries of what he may or may not have done, what he wanted to do with his life and his motivations to put his family back together are slowly and painfully revealed, as he is clearly still haunted by the memories of his past, but still wants to make things right.
All he ever wanted was a piece of land, to re-build his childhood home, and to be happy. This idea has brought him to a personal crossroad, and after spending a brief time in Tinseltown he finally leaves LA with his Hunter in tow to confront Jane (played all too briefly played by Nastassja Kinski) when he hears she is living in Houston.
In the finale, in one of the most emotionally revealing and heart- and gut- wrenching conversations I've ever seen put on film, Travis and Jane (played beautifully by Nastassja Kinski) finally confront each other (of a sorts) and confess how they feel, and what had and has happened. You have to see the scene to understand it, I won't spoil THAT.
This movie is about thinking, and thoughts, and visuals, and the most minor of plot, because it's about Travis trying to pick up the pieces of all of the broken hearts he has broken and gluing them together again. It's haunting, and sad, and will make you weep if you EVER have been in a situation of unresolved relationships and heartache.
The music score by Ry Cooder is sad, billowy, and floats you over the dried yellowed land, carrying you along as the silent stoic visuals of the Old West are brought alive and complimented by Wim - or is it the other way around? On another note: Wim Wenders chose Paris, Texas as title of his movie by reading the United States Road Atlas, but no scene was ever actually shot there.
Wim Wenders (and to a lesser odder extent David Lynch) had that kind of cerebral touch in the late 80's and early 90s. You knew it existed, but you never knew what was around the safe corner. This movie haunted my life for several years after I first watched it. It made me sit in corner and not want to deal with reality. It was also a personal hazy reflection of my life in the early 90s and it still makes me kinda sad.
All in all, a visceral experience in film, slow in a LOT of places, but it's supposed to be! I get it! It's worth your examination, honestly.



Rating:
Summary: Not very good
Review: I really wanted to like this movie, but the movie wouldn't let me. Sorry to disagree with everyone, but this movie is a real stinker. I gave it 2 stars for the music and the cinematography. To call this movie slow is the understatement of the year ... it moves like a sedated tortoise. I really can't understand those people who say that this is the best film they have ever seen ... they can't have seen many films. I have been watching films seriously for about 30 years, and have seen many great ones ... but this ain't one of them.

"Okay, wise guy, you didn't like it. Why?" First of all, let me say that the first part, when the main character interacts with his brother, brother's wife, and his kid (who has been raised by his brother), is far better than the end, when he and his son search for his wife. They find her in Houston by waiting outside a bank and following her car (why not try the phone book first?). Then, unexplainably, Travis leaves the kid with her while he takes off again (going to Paris, Texas? Does he intend to come back?). This, after spending much time re-establishing a relationship with his boy. I'm not one that demands happy endings, but I do like endings that make some sort of sense. I hear that much of the ending was unscripted, and it shows.

Dramas require tension, whether between characters or in the plot ("don't ever open the green door!"). This movie has none, which is a primary reason why it is so terminally dull. Travis (Stanton) is a complex character, but is never fully revealed, and although we may feel sorry for him and his condition, he remains simply a screwed up individual.

Dramas also require some kind of contrast. There is very little of that in the film in any respect.

Great dramas usually have great dialogue. Don't look for any memorable dialogue here. I don't expect Shakespeare, but the totally mundane, inane dialogue in this picture does not serve it well. Shepherd could have done better. And the director must have been watching too many Antonioni films, with all the pauses and lacunae.

Acting? Stockwell, as usual, does a good job. Stanton is mute for much of the first part of the film. When he does finally talk, his lines are delivered in a monotone that could put anyone to sleep. Kinski, Travis' wife, is gorgeous, but doesn't have much of a role.

I recently viewed "Scarecrow" with Gene Hackman and Al Pacino. This is a truly fine drama. "Paris, Texas" could have been a very good drama, but it would have taken a lot of tinkering.

Rating:
Summary: Not very good
Review: I really wanted to like this movie, but the movie wouldn't let me. Sorry to disagree with everyone, but this movie is a real stinker. I gave it 2 stars for the music and the cinematography. To call this movie slow is the understatement of the year ... it moves like a sedated tortoise. I really can't understand those people who say that this is the best film they have ever seen ... they can't have seen many films. I have been watching films seriously for about 30 years, and have seen many great ones ... but this ain't one of them.

"Okay, wise guy, you didn't like it. Why?" First of all, let me say that the first part, when the main character interacts with his brother, brother's wife, and his kid (who has been raised by his brother), is far better than the end, when he and his son search for his wife. They find her in Houston by waiting outside a bank and following her car (why not try the phone book first?). Then, unexplainably, Travis leaves the kid with her while he takes off again (going to Paris, Texas? Does he intend to come back?). This, after spending much time re-establishing a relationship with his boy. I'm not one that demands happy endings, but I do like endings that make some sort of sense. I hear that much of the ending was unscripted, and it shows.

Dramas require tension, whether between characters or in the plot ("don't ever open the green door!"). This movie has none, which is a primary reason why it is so terminally dull. Travis (Stanton) is a complex character, but is never fully revealed, and although we may feel sorry for him and his condition, he remains simply a screwed up individual.

Dramas also require some kind of contrast. There is very little of that in the film in any respect.

Great dramas usually have great dialogue. Don't look for any memorable dialogue here. I don't expect Shakespeare, but the totally mundane, inane dialogue in this picture does not serve it well. Shepherd could have done better. And the director must have been watching too many Antonioni films, with all the pauses and lacunae.

Acting? Stockwell, as usual, does a good job. Stanton is mute for much of the first part of the film. When he does finally talk, his lines are delivered in a monotone that could put anyone to sleep. Kinski, Travis' wife, is gorgeous, but doesn't have much of a role.

I recently viewed "Scarecrow" with Gene Hackman and Al Pacino. This is a truly fine drama. "Paris, Texas" could have been a very good drama, but it would have taken a lot of tinkering.

Rating:
Summary: Magnificent!
Review: In the sixties Antonioni made a similar work about the hopeless , the loneliness of the human being . This tragic mood in a certain way was released again in this work in the eighties with Paris Texas where the sense of the search is bay far , much more important that the search in itself . In the opening shot we see an incredible scene in the vastity of the desert where the wind and the sand seem to be the only friends of our desperate man .
Slowly the camera will show us with merciless focus the nucleus , the dramatis personae . The mirror dialogue sequence with Natasha Kinski is one of the saddest and best achievements ever made for any other film maker. And it is really amazing that all along the years the style of Wenders ran parallel to Antonioni concerns . That is why both of them decided to work togethetr in that film titled Beyond the clouds (1995) with the master of the great silences Michelangelo Antonioni.
This is (in my personal opinion) the second best movie of Wenders , since I consider The wings of desire his most powerful and artistic issue .
Wenders is a poet who inspires in the little concerns of citizen without importance . But the form in which he tells the citizen story is what it really counts . Deeply introspective , the most of their pictures are inmersed in a nosthalgical mood but never conclude in a pesimist conclusion .
One of the most controversial films in the eighties but also powerful and convincing .
Watch it !

Rating:
Summary: Moored and broken.
Review: It's not surprising that Wim Wenders production company is called 'Road Movies'. In the vast majority of his films geography is just as important as characterization and plot. So it is with 'Paris, Texas', where the remarkable vista shots give some sense of the awe and wonder the average European must feel when confronted with this vast American landscape. Originally, Wender's vision was much larger in scope. He wanted the Harry Dean Stanton character to zig-zag his way across the entire country hoping to capture the enormous contrasts of the landscape. In the end though screenwriter Sam Shepard persuaded the German director to base the core of the movie in Texas as this could easily represent the U.S. as a whole.

It's rather unusual to see America through the eyes of a European film crew. The film has a slow, observant quality that contrasts sharply with prevailing American dramas where constant close-ups try to make you feel more involved with the characters. In 'Paris, Texas', Wenders lets the quality of the acting speak for itself without recourse to sentimentality.

The last part of the film was unscripted and tends to drag a bit, but Stanton's understated performance keeps you glued to the screen as the story unfolds. Ry Cooder's score adds a traditional American soundtrack that somehow manages to be something much more ethereal. A poigniant score that colours the film's theme of hope and longing.

Rating:
Summary: Haunting ... and I mean that in a nice way.
Review: Of all the films I've seen in my 40 years, none haunts me more than this one. And really ... what more can we ask of our best art? I only saw it once, but my memory of it is so sublime, so complete, so visceral, that I can almost taste the dust in my mouth. And I'll be damned if Ry Cooder's isn't among the best -- as in most perfectly suited AND eminently listenable -- soundtracks ever.

Rating:
Summary: The 2nd greatest movie of all time (after ERASERHEAD)
Review: Sort of the antithesis of the type of movie ERASERHEAD is, this human drama near-epic is peaceful and down-to-earth, not to mention the only good movie Wenders has ever made. Harry Dean Stanton delivers one of the greatest performances ever captured on screen as a man desperately trying to run from and forget the past. After disappearing for years, he is found near-dead in a desert bar. A phone number in his pocket leads doctors to his brother, played by Dean Stockwell, who flies out to Texas from Los Angeles to pick him up. We spend the next two hours gradually finding out exactly what has happened. Stanton's confrontation with Natassja Kinksi is amazingly heart-wrenching. Quite possibly the most beautiful film in motion picture history.

Rating:
Summary: This is a Perfect Film
Review: This is my very favourite movie of all time. This is a perfect film. From Robbie Mueller's breathtaking cinematography, to Ry Cooder's haunting score everything is an excercise in beauty. (Lead actor) Harry Dean Stanton conveys a disturbing yet gentle portrayal of desire, fatherhood, and loss with great lucidity and pathos. Also noteworthy is Nastasja Kinski, whose chemistry with Stanton is unparalleled in recent cinema. The story is certainly one of Sam Sheperd's finest, as is L.M Kit Carson's nuanced adaptation (he wrote the screenplay--and his son plays Hunter, the child star of the film). While this film is a fine achievement in every aspect it is not for the impatient. Some have called it "slow moving," and it is definitely slow in its pace, but one needs time to savour a film of such subtlety as this. Paris Texas is a film that should not be left out of any serious collection, and is a must see for anyone who still regards filmmaking as a craft. I have lost count of how many times I have watched this film and shared it with others.