Bis ans Ende der Welt |
  • Germany / France / Australia / USA • 1991 • 158m •   • Directed by: Wim Wenders. • Starring: Solveig Dommartin, Pietro Falcone, Enzo Turrin, Chick Ortega, Eddy Mitchell, William Hurt, Adelle Lutz, Ernie Dingo, Jean-Charles Dumay, Sam Neill, Ernest Berk, Christine Oesterlein, Rüdiger Vogler. • Music by: Graeme Revell.      A woman has a car accident with some bank robbers, who enlist her help to take the bank money to a drop in Paris. On the way she runs into another fugitive from the law, an American who is being chased by the CIA. The charges are false, he claims. They want to confiscate a device his father invented which allows anyone to record their dreams and vision. On the run from both the bank robbers and the CIA, the couple span the globe, ending up in Australia at his father's research facility, where they hope to play back the recordings Hurt captured for his blind mother. Set in the futuristic year of 1999, a subplot about a damaged Indian nuclear satellite crashing and causing the end of civilization is a puzzling addition to the film.
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However, I really loved Kurosawa's Ran. Something seemed to be different about it. The pacing was sped up, the characters were more alive, and the general film seemed to be more appealing to one of my disposition. I've tried to steel myself and go back to watch Seven Samurai, because I know it's such a hugely important and influential movie, but I always end up chickening out, thinking that I'll just have the same reaction as last time, "Objectively, this is a very good movie -- but it's just not for me." Or maybe it was just a bad day for me to watch a Kurosawa film -- who knows. Like Ran, I had the same reaction to Until the End of the World. I knew it was a Wim Wenders movie going in, but I was drawn to some other aspects: the soundtrack was made of contemporary music that was very appealing to me, I like Sam Neil a great deal, and I'd seen some good William Hurt movies (though, his occasional wooden acting was a bit of a turn off in others). I think Until the End of the World is more of an experience than it is a film. It has a bit of a dreamlike quality to it, a sort of surrealism that is always in the background, at the edges, and never in the forefront. Maybe I like it so much because it reminds me of the kind of bizarre post-apocalyptic adventure that I might experience in my dreams.
Until the End of the World is classified as a road movie, I suppose. It's got elements of many different styles and genres, but, at its heart, it's the story of one man's journey through the troubled final days of civilization, what happens after the fall, and how people adapt. I remember thinking to myself, "This is amazing. I wonder if the director will have the courage to keep going with this vision and show what happens after the inevitable climax?" Indeed, he did, to my joy. In fact, the movie changes gears, segueing from globe-trotting adventure-mystery to a scifi drama. I can understand how this might confuse or annoy some viewers, but I found it to be fresh and exciting -- much the way that my own dreams frequently will randomly change genre from horror to adventure at the midpoint. Unlike my dreams, however, the change was a natural progression, fluid and sensible. Some people might not have bought this change in genre, but, to me, it seemed to fit perfectly, if you look at the first half of the movie as setup for the second half. If you're uninterested in near-future science fiction or surrealism, I can understand how you'd find the movie to become derailed by the second half. I'd disagree, but I can understand where you're coming from.
I liked Paris, Texas, though I couldn't sit through the entire movie. If I remember correctly, I got most of the way through that movie. With Wings of Desire, I eventually gave up around the halfway point, as I became too frustrated with the slow pacing and late hour. I never went back and finished it, though some day I may. So, if you're the type of person who says, "Wim Wenders? Doesn't he make those really long, slow paced art films? I don't know if I'd like him," give this one a try. Though I generally do enjoy most art films -- even those considered to be impenetrable and slow -- Wim Wenders has always been a bit of a problem for me. Not this time, though.
I've heard that there's a 280 minute director's cut, broken up into a trilogy. Holy crap. I gave this movie a 910, which is pretty rare for me (I usually hover around 6-8, even for movies that I really like), but I don't think even I could sit through that. It just screams "Wim Wenders" to me -- a good idea with a great follow-through, spread out over several hours of glacially slow pacing. I'll probably give it a try some day, but it sounds daunting.
Review by Matt Kracht from the Internet Movie Database.
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