Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #27688 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-02-03
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: PAL, Original recording remastered
• Original language: English, French, German, Hebrew, Turkish
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 128 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
"There are angels over the streets of Berlin," quotes the movie poster, but these are like no angels you've ever seen. Bundled in dark overcoats, they watch over the city with ears open to the heartbeat of the human soul, listening to the internal musings and yearnings of earthbound humans like existential detectives. In these delicate, astounding scenes we float through the thoughts of dozens of Berlin citizens, from the weary and worn to the hopeful and young, as the angels record the magic moments for some heavenly record. When Damiel (the empathic and sensitive Bruno Ganz) falls in love with an angel of another sort, the lonely trapeze artist Marion (willowy, sad-eyed Solveig Dommartin), he gives up the contemplation and observation of life to experience it himself.

Wim Wenders' most purely romantic film is like poetry on celluloid, a celebration of the transient and fragile moments of being human: the warmth of a cup of coffee on a cold day, the embrace of a friend, the touch of a lover, the rapture of love. Opening with an angel's-eye view of Berlin in silvery black and white (delicately captured by the great cinematographer Henri Alekan, who photographed Jean Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast 40 years earlier), it transforms into a gauzy colour world when Damiel "crosses over" by sheer will. Peter Falk plays himself as a fallen angel with a special sensitivity for celestial visitors ("I can't see you, but I know you're there," he proclaims), and Otto Sander, whose smiling eyes brighten a face etched by eons of waiting and watching, is Damiel's partner. Wenders made a sequel in 1993, Faraway, So Close, and Hollywood remade the film as City of Angels with Nicolas Cage and Meg Ryan. --Sean Axmaker, Amazon.com

Special Features
German
Region 2
Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround German
Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
Outtakes
Deleted Scenes
English Commentary By Wim Wenders
Trailer
Photo Gallery
Wim Wenders Biography
English

Customer Reviews

The most beautiful and poetic film of all times
I love this film and I love it because of so many things. I saw it for the first time when I was a teenager in mid 90s and I was so impressed... I was roaming the streets of Almaty (my home town in Kazakhstan) with my best friend and I asked her: "Do you think angels are walking together with us and collecting the spiritual signs of our existence?' Of course, it was a joke, by what a romantic joke... A longing for something magical that can happen to a mortal...

When you first watch the film, you wonder why Wim Wenders has picked two aging men in long black coats to be angels. That's not how you imagined an angel, after all. However, the further you watch the film, the more you realise that their angelic nature is in the way they look at everything, in their increadible eyes.

When I think about this film I think about all the good that can happen to an ordinary human being. This film highlights the best in all of us and makes us immortal for a short while... And I believe this feeling is worth it.

Natalia

This is what the DVD format was made for...
For those of you who already own this film on VHS and have not yet upgraded to DVD, please, do it asap. You won't regret it.

Read the other reviews if you need to be reminded/told what an amazing film this is.
All I want to highlight here is that the DVD extras and picture/sound quality on the DVD transfer are superb. The best feature, in my opinon is the director's commentary. Dry, witty, informative, highly personal - everything anyone who loves this film could want.
From lamenting the sad losses of parts of Berlin and certain personnel involved in realising the film, to revealing in-jokes - cake fights and all - and setting the scene on, well, the 'scene' in Berlin when the film was shot, it's all here.
And, if you already have the DVD and haven't watched the film with commentary, I heartily recommend you do so.

The only other experience I can recommend to add further to one's enjoyment of the film is to visit Berlin itself. What a great city.
And THAT statue. It's one of the most impressive I have ever seen. Beautiful, and a fitting mascot for such a magical film.

Serene, truthful, funny, lyrical, beautiful, haunting
This film is just so lovely - it has haunted me all day (despite a stressful and distracting day at work) and is a film never to be forgotten. I had to order it to keep because I know it is a film I will want to watch at regular intervas for the rest of my like.
The library scenes are particularly haunting and really do convey a strong impression of serenity.
The notes in the bonus material are well worth watching too I watched them because I just wanted more I didn't want to leave this film. It is an average length film but I wish it was an hour longer - like one of those rare books that you really never want to finish
Rent it!!! Buy it!!!