Review of Wings of Desire (1987) by Dallas M — 07 Oct 2014

A high rating is the last thing I thought I would give this movie, after watching the first scene, but here I am, falling right into place with the many other high reviews. "Wings of Desire" is not a film you can judge just by its first impression on you, it requires you to truly open your mind to what the filmmakers are trying to portray to the audience, and understand how each and every aspect they are incorporating into the scenes plays into this image. This movie is not one that will catch the eye of many college freshman today in America, but after analyzing different aspects and meanings of the different scenes, the film lives up to its high ratings.

This movie's title was originally translated to be "The Sky/Heaven Over Berlin", which does an awesome job at showing the true aspect of the film. During the time period in Berlin, the wall had just gone up and separated East and West Berlin. This title is excellent for drawing in and audience that is knowledgeable about this situation at the time, and also adding meaning to the film itself. The wall doesn't go up into the sky, making it the one area of Berlin that was not split, and allowing the angels to see everything and help both sides of the city. The American title being "Wings of Desire" is, in my opinion, needed to draw in an audience that does not live in or around Berlin and does not have that natural motive to go in and watch a movie that is completely set around that location. It is also kind of ironic once you break the film down to its many meanings. The title states "Wings of Desire" when actually the angels in the film are desiring to rid themselves of their wings to experience things that the humans get to experience.

The film goes back and forth between black and white, and colored scenes. The scenes without color are meant to portray what the angels see. They cannot see color because their main objective is to solely observe the acts of the humans. They are not given the ability that humans are, to experience senses. Black and white does a good job at truly setting in this allusion. When you see black and white you don't experience as much emotion and senses from the scene, so being that the angels do not have the ability to understand time, or feel the different emotions of humans, the decision to keep these scenes without color, aids in adding more to the mood of the film for the audience to experience. It's a very black and white, bland world to live in, without the privileges we take for granted daily, so it was smart on the producer's behalf to incorporate the differences in color transitions between scenes into the film. This effect allows the audiences to connect with the main characters even more.

You are introduced to many characters throughout this film, but it's not hard to eventually find who the filmmakers are focusing on. You will notice throughout, that as the angels pass different thoughts of the people around them fumble their way into the ears of the angels, and us, the audience. The fact that we are hearing their thoughts, does not make them a main character that we need to focus on, rather, it simply is there to majority of the time display detail, and emotion to the audience of the film. For example, at one scene in the film, one of the main angels passes a motorcycle accident, with the driver critically injured on the sidewalk. The angels observes for a moment, giving us the chance to hear, and understand the thoughts of this victim. Once the angel takes action, and attempts to change the thoughts of the dying man, we hear his thoughts change to the focus of the small and enjoyable details of human life. This scene adds to the overall theme of the movie, even though this character was only introduced to the audience at this one point. I believe the directors decision to incorporate scenes like this one, aided in the emotional understanding of "Wings of Desire.".

This movie is definitely one that will make its audience think for a bit, to truly be able to grasp the meaning trying to be portrayed to us, but after it is found, the film becomes a grand creation in the minds of many.