Wings of Desire

Rating:
Summary: up with the static and radio
Review: Wim Wenders must have had a divine vision to have created such a trancendental film. every frame has a poetry, a music, that just captures in one shot what other films take whole films to achieve. A film like this could have stopped WWII if given the chance. The angels weap for us, and we journey off into a life of paying no notice of them...but they follow our course anyway.

Rating:
Summary: groovy Germanic fare
Review: I first watched "Wings of Desire" four years ago, while taking a German cinema class in college. Most of the films we watched were thoroughly depressing ("The Marriage of Maria Braun", sorry, all you Fassbinder fans) or outright demented ("The Tin Drum". 'nuff said). Then we watched "Wings...". Have you ever had an experience where something you watch changes you, somehow? Sure, some of the speeches are a bit long-winded, and sometimes you're not quite sure why the characters do what they do (or, you're not sure what they're doing, period), but the overall tone of this movie is absolutely gorgeous in its celebration of the human experience. Humans are portrayed as messy and complex, from the down-and-out guy on the train to the woman about to give birth to the young prostitute on the corner...but hey, we ARE messy and complex. Deal with it. The angels, despite their ability to bring quiet comfort to those they interact with, are invisible to all but children who, with their predilection for magical thinking, not only see them but accept them without question. I love the sense of longing Bruno Ganz (Damiel) brings to the screen--he simply wants to enjoy all the things we take for granted, even if it's eating an apple or having newsprint on his fingers after reading the paper. Never before have I seen a movie that made me appreciate the small things that being human entails, and I've not seen anything since that has spurred me on to such personal fits of philosophy. Shame on Meg Ryan and Nicholas Cage for getting involved with the shabby Hollywood remake! (Plus, "Wings..." has the absolutely brilliant Peter Falk in it. How groovy can one movie get?) Bruno is my hero, Otto Sander is steadfast in his quiet observance, and Solveig Dommartin is perfect as the woman drifting, alone, aware of her power while looking for something she can't quite describe. All in all, it's a delicious movie, one I will watch time and again to uncover the subtleties I've missed previously.

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Summary: The angel who fell to Earth... and in love
Review: Two unhappy angels, Damiel and Cassiel, hang out together and compare notes on their observations of human behaviour. Being immortal, without physical substance, they can't experience the things humans do. They comfort people in pain, hang out in libraries helping readers.

One day, Damiel sees Marion, a French circus trapeze artist, and falls in love with her. He further tells Cassiel that he is fed up with his spiritual existence, of forever hovering alone. He wants to give up his eternity and "to conquer a history for myself"; he wants to become human.

There's also Homer, the aging Jewish poet and storyteller of humanity. In one heartbreaking scene, he is trying to find Potsdamplatz, where he was able to have coffee until the Nazis came in. He thinks "No one has succeded in singing an epic f peace. What's wrong with peace?" and "If mankind loses its storyteller, mankind loses its childhood." Another painful scene is Cassiel as he tries to stop a young man from committing suicide... and fails.

There's interesting commentary on human nature and history. One is from a elderly car driver. There are more borders than ever, such as that between streets, stores, and individuals. "Every proprietor or every tenant sticks up his nameplate like a coat of arms and studies the morning paper as if he were a world leader... Each one takes his own with him and demands a toll when another wants to enter... One can only enter each state with the password. The present-day German soul can only be conquered by he who arrives at each small state with the password. Fortunately, no one is now in this situation [a reference to Hitler?]" The other is Damiel and Cassiel reminiscing about man's first appearance on Earth: "As long as he ran straight ahead, he seemed free and we could laugh with him. But then suddenly, he ran in a zigzag and stones flew. With his flight began another story. The history of wars. It is still going on."

Marion's declaration of love at the end really shows a credible human character. At one point in her speech, we get a closeup of her beautiful face, and it's as if she's speaking not only to the other person, but to all of us. "We are now the times. Not only the whole town, but the whole world is taking part in our decision. We two are now more than us two. We incarnate something. We are sitting in the place of people, and the whole place is full of people who are dreaming the same dream. We are deciding everyone's game. I am ready. Now it's your turn. You hold the game in your hand. Now or never." For her, "there's no greater story than ours" i.e. of two people coming together to forge a history together.

There are three musical numbers here. One is Crime and the City Solution performing the slow stoner jangly gothic number "Six Bells Chime" which Marion grooves to. The other is Nick Cave and the Dolls doing the post-punk "The Carnival" and "From Her To Eternity."

The B&W parts of the movie reflects the angels' point of view but also the bleak, depressing industrial urban landscape of Berlin as does the cello in Jurgen Knieperfs musical score. It comes in colour from the human point of view, in most cases Marion.

Bruno Ganz gives a strong characterization as Damiel--his reactions to discovering his humanity is simply joyful, and Solveig Dommartin's Marion is one of the most interesting, dynamic, prettiest movie characters I've ever witnessed. Marion is the typical example of the free but lonely soul who's aching for someone, and her thoughts make her a captivating person. Her point that loneliness makes her whole once she's sharing herself with that special someone, makes an interesting point.

Peter Falk has a very special role in here--no, not Columbo, but as himself. There's a funny scene where he tries to find a hat to fit the face, so he can appear an anonymous German. But there's a more heartwarming and special scene as well.

One of my all-time favourites and a very special film, which left me asking myself questions posed in the movie: "Why am I me, and why not you? Why am I here and not there? When did time begin, and where does space end? Isn't life under the sun just a dream? Isn't what I see, hear and smell just the mirage of a world before the world?"

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Summary: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds plus Peter Falk=Inspired
Review: This movie (Wings of Desire) is about hope. Hope after war and hope that even angels wish to feel and have the desires that mere mortals experience. The imagination that Wim Wenders shows us is extraordinary. Angels on earth and Peter Falk involved in the mix: I laughed out loud when I understood that twist.

Without saying too much, the story makes you want to believe it all and with hope. To top it all off is the fabulous music including Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds who are also an integral part of the story line.

This movie works on so many levels and I highly recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: A film that nearly overwhelms me each time I see it
Review: No movie that I see on a regular basis makes me feel so powerfully the joy of being alive as this one. Although many films and numberless and sappy television shows since 1987 have used angels of one dreadful sort or another, Wim Wenders managed to success while all the others failed. Working from a story by celebrated writer Peter Handke, Wenders takes angels that seem to have more in common with Rilke's Duino Elegies than the Bible or the New Age angels. Their function is to watch and observe and record, and in their own limited fashion, to comfort and commiserate. The trick wasn't to come up with the gimmick of angels being able to listen to the thoughts of humans, but to make those thoughts beautiful and representative of all that is quintessentially human. The trick wasn't to have the angels see in black and white and the humans in color, but in making what was seen, whether two or many toned, beautiful. One has only to see the absolutely appalling CITY OF ANGELS, an English language remake starring Meg Ryan and Nicholas Cage, to see that having gimmicks isn't enough; you must have substance as well.

This is not a perfect film. There are some dull moments, and I thoroughly dislike a couple of moments in the film, in particular, Dommartin's speech to Bruno Ganz in the bar near the end of the film. But there are so many magnificent moments, so many moments where they not merely get something right, but produce a moment of almost transcendent beauty, that WINGS OF DESIRE provides more than entertainment, but something akin to a reason to live. The movie becomes in the end a celebration of life, of all the tawdry elements that go into being human. The movie ends in affirming nearly as many things as Walt Whitman does in "Song of Myself."

I love the cast. Bruno Ganz is perfect as Damiel, the central angel of the story. Likewise, Otto Sander's face is the perfect receptacle for all that he witnesses on his silent rounds through Berlin, while Solveig Dommartin is so sympathetic a character, so lovely, that one could imagine an angel or anyone else yearning to be with her. And Peter Falk turns in a remarkably quirky character role, playing himself on location in Berlin. The city itself emerges as a major actor, providing what is certain to stand as the last great visual representation of Berlin in the last couple of years before the Wall fell. Curt Bois was a veteran character actor who was a staple in Hollywood films in the 1930s and 1940s, playing a vast number of waiters and tailors and hotel clerks (he plays the pickpocket at the very beginning of CASABLANCA). In what would be the last role before his death, Bois appropriately plays "Homer," the ancient man remembering all that had occurred in Berlin in the past several decades, playing the role of human witness to counterbalance the angelic witnesses.

This film and UNTIL THE END OF THE WORLD, a Wenders film that followed this one in 1991 have to have two of the best soundtracks I have encountered. Subtract either "Six Bells Chime" by Crime and the City Solution or "From Her to Eternity" by Nick Cave, and this would have been far less of a film, and the scene where Solveig Dommartin changes in her trailer while listening to Nick Cave do "The Carny" might be the best scene in the film.

Rating:
Summary: Slow start, but beautiful
Review: I own the british version of the DVD (got it from England last week). The story here does moves very slowly (I need to be in the right mood to watch it). If you don't like slow, philosophical movies, don't buy this. If you do, you definately need to see this film at least once, especially if you're a fan of City of Angels.

This is a 2 hour movie that feels more like 6 hours to me. I think that the cinematography is beautiful and the dialogue is wonderful. I especially like the "Als das Kind, Kind war..." sequences. Very poetic. Peter Falk was really incredible in this movie too. Throughout the movie, I find myself looking forward to the next Peter Falk scene.

I do have a problem with the subtitles. They are not always correct translations of the dialogue. Generally the translations make stronger statements than what was said in German (which is often meant to be a little ambiguous). I also really think that the German title is a better, more beautiful description of the movie: Der Himmel über Berlin - The sky over Berlin.

I also have a small problem with the plot, which is the same problem I had with the awful American remake, City of Angels. In both movies, the women are beautiful, nice people, but I just don't see what, in the history of mankind, was SO special about them, to draw the angel to them. This was portayed better in Der Himmel über Berlin than City of Angels, it's more of a "right place and time" type thing, but I still felt a little empty about it.

Anyways, great movie. If you like art house movies, it's a must see.

Rating:
Summary: Fallen Angels
Review: It should be illegal to try to remake movies that are in essence opposed to the simplistic, predictable , and formulaic movies produced for mass consumption. This movie was incredibly unique and poignant, and accomplished such a feat with the help of "Colombo" (yes, T.V.'s Colombo!) , an idea as death-defying as certain circus acts portrayed in the movie. The intensity throughout is staggering, evoking serious and bizarre questions such as: What does it mean to live? Are we not all fallen angels? Who will be there to narrate our own lives as our experiences drift into oblivion? Is that Colombo? How does Colombo fit into the movie?------perfectly German!!!!

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Summary: DVD available (in Europe)
Review: For those of you looking for the DVD version, it *is* available. It was just released in the UK (www.amazon.co.uk) and has English subtitling, along with a separate audio track with running commentary by Wenders.
A word of caution, however: the DVD will only work on players set for "Region 2" DVD disks (Europe, Middle East, and Japan). Also, the output is in PAL, not NTSC, format. If you have a computer with a DVD/CD-ROM drive set to Region 2, this is your easiest way to go.
Also, for those of you *really* into the film, as I am, there is a book version of the complete script (in German), including about 40 or 50 stills from the film as well as details on the setup and action in each camera shot. Titled "Der Himmel über Berlin: Ein Filmbuch" (ISBN 351802406X), it's availabe from www.amazon.de
Happy viewing!

Rating:
Summary: Seemed longer than it really was...
Review: I've just finished watching "Wings of Desire" for the second time and feel my initial review may have been a bit too harsh. I still don't like the movie and won't be watching it again but I must admit that it does have a few redeeming qualities.

The three main actors are wonderful; I especially liked Bruno Ganz's portrayal of the weary angel Damiel. Damiel has been observing the earth since time began and longs to do more than just observe. During his conversations with fellow angel Casiel (Otto Sander) he expresses his dream to experience life and free will: to feel rain on his head, taste coffee, smoke cigarettes and even do something bad! Casiel is a bit more accepting of his lot but we can see as the film progresses that he too feels unfulfilled. When Damiel gets his wish and becomes human Casiel gets to experience his joys second hand and we can see that it is just a matter of time before Casiel too will take the plunge (see the sequel, "Far Away, So Close" for Casiel's story) Solveig Dommartin plays the beautiful circus performer that Damiel falls in love with which gives him the final incentive to give up his angelic existence. Peter Falk's portrayal of himself as a former fallen angel was surprisingly good and the idea of an angel becoming an actor is perfect! What better profession for an angel who has spent eternity observing the best and worst of the human condition!

The cinematography was exceptional. There were moments of real emotion in the film: Damiel's encounter with a man in a subway train and Casiel's attempt to prevent a suicide, Damiel comforting a hysterical woman in labor. The occasional flashbacks to World War II footage of Berlin and photographs of Nazi atrocities provide ample evidence of the bad side of humans. I wish we had been shown more of the good side though.

For me, the movie seemed to drag on. Scenes were too long, soliloquies were endless, and points were made and remade. The library scene would have been more effective if we had been given some idea of what the people were reading (why no subtitles in that scene?) I probably would have appreciated spending so much time listening to Nick Cave if I liked that kind of music. Marion and Damiel's first meeting in the bar spent too much time on her musings while Damiel stood there with his head down, I wish he had been given some lines to say! There seemed to be too many depressing scenes and not enough uplifting or joyous, I wanted to see something that would give me a reason for wanting to be human.

The movie had outstanding acting, cinematography and an original idea. I personally didn't enjoy it but others obviously love it so what do you have to lose? Buy the film and judge for yourself, you may find a new favorite!

Rating:
Summary: Stunning
Review: The remake is standard Hollywood gloss, but the original is stunning, sensitive and moving. Words don't do it justice, neither does VHS -- for those with a multi-region DVD player, this IS available on DVD from Amazon's UK site.