Palermo Shooting

A big-budget feature film version of a mixtape: the conceit of letting the audience hear what the protagonist's personal playlist sounds like in their head when they wear their earbuds was executed very well by the seemingly arbitrary song selection to juxtapose with the action. It never felt like a "music video" yet this film has the look and all the trappings. I've been a fan of Wim Wenders for a long time but I somehow missed this one on its first release. The dream sequences are quite unique and effective; this film is Wenders as a cinema stylist. The film has an advertising gloss with the kind of patchwork of collage. I had no expectations coming into the film but I knew that I wasn't in the mood for anything intense. I got want I wanted. It's a visually stunning but understated trip-to-Italy film and I felt like I discovered a hidden gem. A must for any fan of Lou Reed; a decade later perhaps it's time to re-watch Palermo Shooting.

Since I saw "Der Himmel über Berlin" approximately 3 years ago I've become a valid Vim Venders fan. After that day, I always thought, Wim Wenders had something original to say. Palermo Shooting hasn't changed my verdict, well... Almost. The Thing about Palermo Shooting that I guess, this movie tells the well known story with different methods. The methods that little bit um, shall we say cheesy? Of course, this doesn't mean that it's not a enjoyable movie. It's very "warm" movie after all. But despite all this "warmness", you think in somewhere, something/things is/are missing in this movie. Still, it's worth to watching.

I can't add much to hpark5's fine comments (though I'd encourage him or her to make use of paragraph breaks) so I won't attempt a full review of Palermo Shooting. I will mention, however, that when I saw the film at the Berlin and Beyond Film Festival in San Francisco, it was received enthusiastically by an audience of over a thousand people in a packed theater.

Wim Wenders was present and answered questions after the film. The things he said were exceptionally thoughtful and responsive. Although his work may be uneven because of his willingness to take risks, I thought Palermo Shooting a major success. Wender's integration of the death theme with Palermo's ancient and decaying physical environment was especially impressive.

To me, the crucial moment of the film occurs when Finn, the photographer, asks Death what he can do for him. Death says that no one has asked him this before and that the only thing that he can do is to live well for the rest of his life.

I just saw the movie in International Film Festival of Durrës, eager as I was for another Wim Wenders experience. And I left the theater with mixed feelings. Images were so good, bur the story was so cheap. The apology of Death at the end of the movie was awful, as if written by a 15 years scholar. So was the dialogue with the shepherd. Cheap and cliché ideas about death and life. The presence in the story of G. Mezzogiorno was senseless and not justified at all. The story of a photographer that takes a shoot of Death, is not bad, whatsoever. But it surely didn't to be treated as in child books, with death coming towards you and moralizing about life and death. And above all, the pregnant Milla, pretending deeper art in VIP Photo shooting, gave a sense of pity. No worth seeing it twice.

I saw it yesterday at a late evening screening in Los Angeles with Wenders in-attendance, and he did an intro and stayed for a Q&A afterward (which ended at 1:30am!)

I'd describe Palermo Shooting as an interesting failure, though with some good stuff in it. And not as a worst-ever film, or even as awful like some folks. Also interesting to me was how the naturalistic Wenders of "Paris, Texas" days has embraced modern CGI effects.

Dennis Hopper, in his last role, was very good in a small but important supporting part in the very last scene of the film (don't walk out early or quit watching, cause you'd miss Hopper).

It's kind of a 3 act play defining by its locations: Act 1. Dusseldorf, Act 2. Palermo, Act 3. Gangi.

Not one of Wenders good ones. But if it had some editing-out of some of the more pretentious musing stuff, and general tightening-up, and a bit of clarification here and there, it could've been pretty good. Too bad...

For a long and detailed plot summary, see the German Wikipedia page (worthwhile to do even putting up with Google Chrome's German-to-English translation.) It helped clarify a lot for me. de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palermo_Shooting (Note: the English Wikipedia page was very minimal).