The landscape of love...

In the commentary to 'Wings of Desire,' Wim Wenders speaks about his then desire to return to Germany, to Berlin, to make a movie about the city, explaining further the duality of his feelings for a rapidly changing, commercially and socio-politically, urban unreality. In the 25 years since Wenders decided to make his masterpiece much, and perhaps, in many respects, little, has changed. What has remained however, is Wenders' singularly unique cinematic vision.

'Wings of Desire,' is one of the great films. It owes some debt to Wenders' first film, 'Summer in the City,' and, especially so, to the films of the great Russian director, Andrei Tarkovsky - to whom the film is partly dedicated. What makes the film great, however, is its convincing ability to make us, the viewers, feel compellingly lost in our own all too human inadequacies, our individual, yet shared tragedies, whilst offering hope and counsel and a collective understanding of our grief, our happiness, our joy at being no more, no less, than alive.

It is magic on film. Watch it.