Wings of Desire (1987)

Wings of Desire (1987) is a lyrical, quietly powerful film about two invisible angels — Damiel and Cassiel — who wander a divided West Berlin, watching over lonely, grief-stricken and ordinary human lives. The angels listen to people’s thoughts, offer small consolations and observe a city haunted by history: a failing circus and its trapeze artist Marion, an elderly man searching for meaning, and a film crew shooting a wartime detective picture that brings an outsider’s eye into the story. Watching this film is more like entering a poem than a conventional romance. You experience long, observant tracking shots, intimate interior monologues and a world seen through the calm, compassionate vantage of immortals. The movie alternates between the cool, detached vantage of the angels and the lush immediacy of human sensation — when Damiel falls in love with Marion he chooses to relinquish his immortality to taste touch, smell, joy and sorrow. The transition from angelic detachment to human feeling is rendered visually and emotionally: silence gives way to sound, monochrome to color, and philosophical reflection to the intense, risky intimacy of being alive. Tone and pacing are contemplative and slow by design; the film rewards patience and reflection. Director Wim Wenders blends fantasy, drama and romance with philosophical questions about loneliness, longing, memory and what it means to be present in the world. The result is melancholic but ultimately moving — a meditation on love, mortality and the small mercies that make human life worth living. Good for viewers who enjoy art-house cinema, poetic visuals, and films that linger on mood and ideas rather than plot-driven action. Expect to come away moved, thoughtful, and more aware of the textures of ordinary life.

Actors: Bruno Ganz, Solveig Dommartin, Otto Sander

Director: Wim Wenders

Runtime: 128 min

Genres: Drama, Fantasy, Romance

7.3 /10 79 /100 7.9 /10 7.7 /10