Wim Wenders

Weird, I've just returned from watching Kings of the Road. And yeah, it's great. Might prefer Alice in the Cities, though.

Alice's the best.

just can't get a proper Kit Carson apprec in any thread....

I don't know if it's online, but Carson had a production diary on Paris, Texas published upon the film's release in a film mag. An excerpt was passed out at the screening I wrote about upthread. At one point during shooting Carson and Wenders had to conference call with Sam Shepherd (then shooting Country) from their hotel room in Houston so they could come up with a satisfactory ending to shoot the next day (the script just tapered off).

Alice > Kings of the Road, but its a close thing.

XP Apparently he also published a diary for the Breathless remake, which he said was a production that "almost didn't get started" as opposed to P,T which "almost didn't finish".

i see the library has a David Holzman's Diary book (c1970), no idea what that is.

^^Probably a transcription of the film with stills.

where's the gif upthread from? Goalie?

Yes.

Saw a lovely 35mm print of Paris, Texas tonight, more than enough compensation for Nastassja no-show for Q&A. Not nearly the best WW though, but Stanton and the kid are tops.

Carson and Wenders had to conference call with Sam Shepherd (then shooting Country) from their hotel room in Houston so they could come up with a satisfactory ending to shoot the next day

They didn't.

J.Ro quite accurate in thinking this was WW's "John Ford film."

also if you haven't seen it projected, you've missed out.

NY MoMA retro in March; incl a night with WW and Peter Handke

http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/films/1557

Paris, Texas still entrances on rewatch. (A lot of that is photographic/ cinematographic, which I don't discuss in this post.)

It's such a strange and (I think) unique film, narratologically speaking. Which is why even the scenes that bothered/ disappointed me on first watch (e.g. the talky scenes across the one-way mirror) interest and fascinate me more, on rewatching, when I've let go of/ lost any of the narratological/ cinematic/ other expectations I might have had on first viewing (e.g. re the mystery of Travis's muteness: on first watch, almost *anything* would be a disappointment, i.e. any specific narrative explaining the mystery of the movie's first half).

I watched it a few times, and the things that started to bother me then still do. The two big scenes between HDS and Kinski, most of all: they go on forever and bring the film to a complete halt. Also the improbability of how long it takes Kinski to realize who she's talking to.

Yeah this bothered me too; but one thing that counters this (on rewatch) is something Kinski's character says, that over the years every man she heard on the other side of the mirror sounded like Travis. It makes watching her experience re knowledge/ discovery (hearing someone who sounds like "Travis" from the beginning- like many other men have sounded to her like Travis, including Travis himself the day before) more interesting and complicated.

One of the interesting/ strange things in this movie which affect me (not the most striking but for me among the most haunting) is something it has in common with Hitchcock's Vertigo: Stanton's character's French wife (for years basically Hunter's "mother") drops out of the movie midway, with that poignant phonecall, just as Midge (with that poignant conversation with the doctor) drops out of Vertigo.

When I (subjectively) rewatch Paris, Texas, I am (almost) as moved by the situation/ experience of French "mom" as I am by the situations/ experiences of Travis and Kinski's character. When I (subjectively) rewatch Vertigo, I am (almost) as moved by the situation/ experience of Midge as I am by the situation/ experience of Stewart's and Novak's characters.

I just think that's an interesting and particular facet to a movie: to be haunted by a character who is lost to us midway of a movie, for whom there is (or with which we as viewers have) no closure.

I only thought of this facet because today the Almodovar thread is among the recent answers, and one of the things I liked or noticed about Broken Embraces is that the Midge character-- obviously alluded to as the Vertigo "Midge" character in the scene with the doctor at the seaside-- gets to have closure and a happy ending, in a way.

xp - wow, they're also showing The Left-handed Woman. Might lead the way to a DVD release.

should i see the 5-hr Until the End of the World? liked the shorter version.

obv the earlier lesser-seen-now stuff is what i prefer to concentrate on

Only saw the shorter one myself. What you going to see next?

next? not been yet, plus have Rendezvous tix this wkend. Two on Sunday, maybe.

Does that mean you won't see him in person? He really is kind of charming.

http://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2015/mar/04/wim-wenders-retrospective-five-to-watch-one-to-miss

Stupid piece. Kings of the Road is one of his best.

would've been nice if i could've seen him, but not gonna do a repeat of the few i've already seen when there's other fish to fry. (I reserved a seat for Alice in the Cities the other night, then realized i was going to see An Octoroon in Brooklyn.)

Shorter version of Until the End of World felt kind of rushed throughout the first half so I could well imagine the longer version being an improvement.

the longer version is an huge improvement, but if you hated it before it won't change your mind. it's my favorite.

I think Wenders peaked early--in the mid-late 1970s. "until the end..." is one of the brighter spots in his later filmography, albeit a very spotty film.

make sure you see "summer in the city" and the early shorts if they are showing them.

Lisbon Story is a great late career highlight. All went bust after that one

the schedule is kind of maddening; The State of Things only showing during weekday working hours.

no actually that's Tokyo-Ga. also the tix for Until are gone, i'm going to get in the standby line,

Everybody on the standby or rush line got into Goalie's Anxiety so good luck.

At one point during the Q&A on Wednesday Peter Handke said something about his hero Goethe and Ian Buruma thought he was talking about Günter Grass, which really set Handke off.

Sorry, wasn't really a Q&A it was a discussion led by Ian Buruma.

I had no idea these were packed... i suck at guessing what will draw at MoMA, but there wasn't even a Times article!

lol

There's certainly great stuff in the uncut UtEotW, particularly the nightscapes and the Australian desert sunlight. (Distressed digital visions -- meh, if that sorta thing thrills you.) But damn, the plot is usually inert, and all that strained Oedipal stuff with Hurt, von Sydow and Moreau (luminous) in the second half... Wenders definitely gets prophecy points for the two characters who ultimately wander around with video monitors of their dreamlife in their hands.

Solveig Dommartin really couldn't act, at least up to the dubious demands of this role.

Anyway it had the Janus logo on it, so CC should be putting it out soonish.

WW did a Q&A, called the success of the soundtrack "an open wound." "If everyone who bought it had seen the film...!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtVA6nKygFs

Had not known about his marriage to Ronee Blakely until I saw her name in a crossword today.

whaa...? Me neither.

Saw Wrong Move yesterday, and it pretty much was.

Wrong Move is a hard one - the height of his "incommunicability" phase. Rewatched it a couple of years ago when the DVD came out, I was surprised to remember how vividly that film resonated with me as a teen - but I guess I don't have space for this kinda stuff in my life these days.

Hanna Schygulla overshadowed, perhaps, by silent unclothed 15-yo N Kinski

otherwise lots of walking, sitting and talking

i like wrong move, but it wears its influences—and its Themes— on its sleeve more than the other films made around that time. in a sense it's as much a peter handke film as a wim wenders film. but it's beautifully made, and a pleasure just to watch the moving bodies in counterpoint to the moving camera.

there are moments in kings of the road—and big chunks of the wrong move—that ominously prefigure the more gaseous, pretentious wenders films to come. in fact i think you can kind of draw a straight line between some of the more ponderous aspects of those films to the overwhelmingly ponderous wings of desire (which i don't like much, but grudgingly respect)... and of course the later films, where all the received ideas come out like a torrent and overwhelm what was once fresh about Wenders's cinema.

but he kept that stuff in check for a while, up through the state of things, at least. it's tempting (and maybe too easy?) to draw a line through his career around the time of his ill-fated association w/ coppola; nearly all the films made before that are ones i treasure (a major exception being the misbegotten scarlet letter) and nearly all made after that i can take or leave (mostly leave).

the last new wenders i've seen is "don't come knocking," which i would have walked out on except that i came with a group.

Sorry for misspelling: Ronee Blakley

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_W8sPd0uEM

http://articles.latimes.com/1985-10-25/entertainment/ca-14420_1_ronee-blakley

Summer in the City is set in a dirty urban winter -- oh, the 24-year-old film student's japery!

It's about as distended and tedious as any film featuring about 20 Kinks songs on the soundtrack can be.

I'm discovering I really don't like Wenders' deep catalog, so thanks, MoMA.

yeah, it's def. in the "pretentious student film" category, but it's interesting in light of what was shortly to come -- and very rare (it's never been on home video that i know of).

the kinks songs, btw, are why the film has never been properly released (although morbs might argue it's also b/c it's terrible). a similar issue afflicts several of his short films from that period, most of which use american rock music on their soundtracks. indeed, the soundtracks are as often as not the subjects of the films.

i can't recall if summer in the city actually features the song "summer in the city"

it does. the whole thing.

also a complete TV perf of the Kinks doing "Days," which I'll take over Solveig D caterwauling her way through it (RIP). and there's a short lecture on Three Godfathers.

A few minutes later, Franco materializes at the museum, because that is what James Franco does, and walks up to Wenders. Franco gives him a bear hug, then begins talking — about shooting "Every Thing"; about giving Wenders a cameo role in his own new directorial effort "Zeroville" ("Larry the Hippie," Franco says; "Larry the Elderly Hippie," Wenders corrects); about a Björk exhibit at the museum; about several other matters on Franco's mind.

After Franco leaves, Wenders turns to a reporter and asks, "Do you think there's only one of him?"

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-wim-wenders-20150312-story.html