Wings of Desire / City of Angels
WINGS OF DESIRE (DER HIMMEL ÜBER
BERLIN) (12)
D: Wim Wenders
Road Movies/Argus (Wim Wenders & Anatole
Dauman)
West Germany 🇩🇪 1987
127 mins
Fantasy/Romance
W: Wim Wenders & Peter Handke
DP: Henri Alekan
Ed: Peter Przygodda
Mus: Jürgen Knieper
Bruno Ganz (Damiel), Solveig Dommartin (Marion), Otto
Sandler (Cassiel), Curt Bois (Homer), Peter Falk (Peter)
It's unfortunate that the insipid Hollywood remake (City
Of Angels) will be better known than Wim Wender's original film, which is a beautifully filmed visual poem about the afterlife.
The story sees a pair of angels roam around Berlin, shot
with picturesque black and white photography, and one of them decides he wants to be human after he falls in love with a circus entertainer.
Perhaps it's because it isn't in the English language, or
perhaps it's because it's an art house film, but one thing's for sure, Wings Of Desire is amongst the most underappreciated films of the 1980's as far as audiences are
concerned.
At least the critics lavished it with the praise that's
fully deserved.
8/10
CITY OF ANGELS (12)
D: Brad Silberling
Warner Bros./Regency/Atlas (Charles Roven &
Dawn Steel)
USA/Germany 🇺🇸 🇩🇪 1998
117 mins
Romance/Fantasy
W: Dana Stevens [based on the screenplay "Wings Of
Desire" by Wim Wenders]
DP: John Seale
Ed: Lynzee Klingmann
Mus: Gabriel Yared
PD: Lilly Kilvert
Nicolas Cage (Seth), Meg Ryan (Dr. Maggie Price),
Andre Braugher (Cassiel), Dennis Franz (Nathaniel Messinger), Colm Feore (Jordan Ferris)
Sappy, slushy and schmaltzy remake of German film
Wings Of Desire, relocating the action to America where an angel falls in love with a heart surgeon and wishes to become human.
Even for those who haven't seen the original, this
film is so sugary that it should come with a medical warning for diabetics.
Female audience members seemed to fawn over its
romantic story, despite the direction overly trying to tug heart-strings with ridiculous compositions (the scene with Meg Ryan on her bike is hilarious rather than
saddening).
The soundtrack features a collection of very good
songs, including The Goo Goo Dolls' brilliant 'Iris', but as a film it's trite.
4/10
