88
Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington
In Faraway, So Close we watch a city being reborn, an angel trapped in melodrama and a dream dying. All are moving. [23 Dec 1993, p.10N]
Faraway, So Close! (In weiter Ferne, so nah!)
Critic Rating
(read reviews)User Rating
- Germany
- 1993
- · 144m
Director
Wim Wenders
Cast
Otto Sander,
Bruno Ganz,
Nastassja Kinski,
Peter Falk,
Solveig Dommartin,
Heinz Rühmann
Genre
Drama,
Fantasy,
History
The film opens with the angel Cassiel (Otto Sander) standing on the statue of the Angel of Victory overlooking post-Cold War Berlin. Growing ever more despondent over his fate as a mere observer of human life, rather than a vital part of it, Cassiel dreams of "crossing over" to the human world.And he does, as Karl Engel, a man who perhaps knows too much, perhaps like in many of Hitchcock's films, some harmless citizen who gets involved in an affair to which he is not up to. In fact, there is no one as kind and harmless as this newborn citizen of the Earth.We will follow Cassiels's adventures into a "thriller." This story which gets mangled with his own life is about weapons, more precisely about a weapon deal where the weapons - or INSTRUMENTS of violence -- are traded for IMAGES of violence.(Text from Wim Wenders site)
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What are critics saying?
80
Los Angeles Times by Kevin Thomas
Wenders’ ideas, emotions--and his characters--eventually do converge in a stately manner, rewarding the patient with a stunning, enlarging vision of human experience, a melding of the material and spiritual worlds.
75
Philadelphia Inquirer by Steven Rea
It's a grand and glorious mishmash of the Bible and the Beats, of German expressionism and Hollywood B- movies, at once pretentious and naive, jokey and deadly serious. You'll love it or you'll hate it, and you know who you are. [04 Feb 1994, p.03]
75
Chicago Sun-Times by Peter Keogh
Any movie featuring cameos ranging from Lou Reed to Mikhail Gorbachev has its heart in the right place. That heart is what sustains it; though long and uneven, occasionally sentimental and portentous in its message, Faraway, So Close comes close enough to greatness. [23 Dec 1993, p.29]
70
The New York Times by Caryn James
Like Mr. Wenders's previous film, last year's "Until the End of the World," this one begins as a swirl of dazzling ambition and at midpoint turns into a mess. Even so, and even at 2 hours and 20 minutes, it is one of the more intriguing messes on screen.
63
Boston Globe by Jay Carr
To get right to it, Wim Wenders' Faraway, So Close isn't anywhere near as sublime and magical as his "Wings of Desire." In fact, his new film about angels is sort of a mess, collapsing under the weight of too much plot and too little poetry. That being said, I hasten to add that it's my kind of mess. [28 Jan 1994, p.47]
63
Washington Post by Rita Kempley
Like the original, Wings 2 is endearing, even if it is a spiritual muddle.
63
ReelViews by James Berardinelli
Unlike its predecessor, this is not a light, mystical romance, but a somewhat muddled narrative that ends up resembling an offbeat action/adventure movie. It's still a film about issues -- humanity, the soul, time, and Nazism -- but it lacks many of the "art" aspect of Wings, relying more on straightforward storytelling.
63
USA Today by Mike Clark
It's amusing, but also rather silly - offering still more evidence that Wenders seems to have seen a few hundred Hollywood genre pics too many. [30 Dec 1993, p.4D]
60
Empire
The eccentric performances make this otherwise flawed film work.
60
Empire by Lol Frost
The eccentric performances make this otherwise flawed film work.
50
Variety by Todd McCarthy
Overlong and ultra-slow, this meditation on the sad state of things will tax the patience of even dedicated Wenders fans.
50
Washington Post by Desson Thomson
Faraway...is vaguely deflating, a film that doesn't build to a powerful climax so much as gradually run out of air.
50
Austin Chronicle by Marc Savlov
It's a mess, but it's Wenders' mess, and that means that there are any number of salvageable parts to the whole.
40
Time Out
The movie meanders for two and a half hours, has glaring continuity gaps, and repeatedly confuses self-consciousness with irony, sincerity with significance. There are grace notes here, but Wenders' ambitions seem far, far away.
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