WINGS OF DESIRE

WINGS OF DESIRE (Dir. Wim Wenders, 1987, 128 mins) is one of cinema’s loveliest city symphonies. Bruno Ganz is Damiel, an angel perched atop buildings high over Berlin who can hear the thoughts—fears, hopes, dreams—of all the people living below. But when he falls in love with a beautiful trapeze artist, he is willing to give up his immortality and come back to earth to be with her. Peter Falk plays himself, a philosophical film and TV star (often addressed as “Columbo” by other characters!), who is making a movie in Germany and is one of the few people who can sense the presence of the invisible celestial spirits. Made not long before the fall of the Berlin wall and often considered a metaphor for the reunification of Germany, WINGS OF DESIRE won the 1987 Best Director award at Cannes and remains an achingly beautiful and poetic meditation on life…