Wenders: From Düsseldorf to Tokyo via Palermo and Cannes
Campino and Wim Wenders - star and director of Palermo Shooting (Getty Images)
Palermo Shooting, the latest film from LiC favorite Wim Wenders, is scheduled to be unveiled in competition at Cannes on Saturday, but according to a Reuters interview from Scott Roxborough, Wenders was still working on mixing the film when the festival began and the final version didn’t arrive until just yesterday.
The thriller stars Andreas “Campino” Frege (the lead singer of German rock band Die Toten Hosen) as a successful but frazzled photographer who leaves his hometown of Düsseldorf for Palermo, Sicily in the hope of getting a little rest and relaxation. All is well until an assassin shows up to kill him. Personally, I hate when that happens. Dennis Hopper and Lou Reed co-star.
Palermo is scheduled to open in Germany in November 2008, but hasn’t been picked up for US distribution as of this writing.
Meanwhile, Variety’s John Hopewell reports that Wenders has already put together the financing for his next project, the Japan-set psychological thriller The Miso Soup for which Willem Dafoe is in talks to star as a serial killer on the loose in Tokyo’s red light district. Dafoe previously starred in Far Away So Close!, Wenders’ 1993 follow-up to LiC Top 10 Desert Island Pick: Wings of Desire (Der Himmel Uber Berlin).
Miso is scheduled to begin filming in February ‘09 with a fall 2010 premiere.
Filed under: Film Festivals, News, Upcoming
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Wenders is in the rare company of Lynch and the Coens in that the one sentence synopsis of his films’ plots rarely conveys the full realm of everything that is going on.
That said, I never guessed he’d move anywhere near a thriller after Don’t Come Knocking. Way to surprise me, Wim.
I really need to see Don’t Come Knocking. Did you like it, Joel?
Films starting with the word “Don’t” always intrigue me. Don’t Look Back, Don’t Look Now… Of course, that’s partly how I got sucked into the suck of Don’t Say a Word (that and Sean Bean and my friends wanted to see it).
Alexander, Don’t Come Knocking got fairly well clobbered by critics but it was one of my favorite movies of that year.
It had plenty of flaws if you want to dwell on them, but there was so much to like about it I found it all easily forgiven. It’s no Wings of Desire, but then not many films are.
My viewing benefited from low expectations. The reviews were pretty bad so I was expecting the worst.
Hmm, okay… I’ve seen every Wenders film but Don’t Come Knocking, and I keep kicking myself for not having seen it yet. I will in the near future, though. I do remember the critics largely detesting it.
However, I also remember some criticisms seeming like natural Wenders attributes. “It meanders…” Yeah, Wenders meanders, and I like it, so shut up.
Looking forward to it; thanks for the input, Craig.
I skipped Don’t Come Knocking {because I didn’t know any better back then} but if I am not mistaken, it is on TV tomorrow night. I think I want to see it.
“However, I also remember some criticisms seeming like natural Wenders attributes.” Yes! It was late in coming, but Don’t Come Knocking was when I first realized I shouldn’t trust critical opinion and it’s really when I stopped reading reviews before I see movies for the most part.
That same year they totally got The Notorious Bettie Page wrong too, but that’s an issue for another day….
You should check it out Nick. It’s got a wonderful performance by Ms. Jessica Lange which is worth the price of admission in my book.
So we’ve established it. Critics are nice and all, but they can be as useless as a jar of peanut butter in a seafood restaurant’s kitchen.
hahhah. They’re fine after the fact or for steering me towards movies I don’t know anything about, but they’re not to be trusted for movies I’m already interested in.