Wow………just WOW.
Right now, I’m finishing watching Part 3 of Wim Wenders’ film trilogy Until the End of the World (Bis ans Ende der Welt), and I can honestly say that all three parts are just phenomenal. The acting, the multilingual proficiency, the plot, the sci-fi, the music, the drama, the comedy, the pathos…..EVERYTHING. JUST PERFECT.
If this is a "road movie", then its an epic road movie, epic in the perfection, epic in the diverse range of topical variety, epic in the variety of emotions elicited by the ensemble cast (including Jeanne Moreau, Max von Sydow, Sam Neill, Eddie Dingo, Rüdiger Vogler, and the late Solveig Dommartin in a stunning lead performance).
The science fiction element is present, but mostly subdued, throughout the film until the latter section of part 2, when the long-awaited destruction of a stray Indian nuclear satellite by an American missile over the atmosphere sends the entire main cast into the middle of Australia’s outback and into the lab/home of Hurt’s character’s parents. At that point, the film really kicks the sci-fi element into high gear, or should I say, "high post-nuke-apocalyptic semi-cyberpunk concept".
I don’t want to give the rest of the plot away, as I originally decided to download the film because I had been looking a while back for discussion on dream recording/imaging, in which one’s own dream is recorded for later playback; since I’ve had a long-standing interest in lucid dreaming, and since lucid dreaming generally demands of the dreamer an ability to perform dream recall, I think that the type of dream recording that is shown in this film would allow for the propagation and advancement of lucid dreaming to the lay dreamer.
However, this film is about much more than just dream recording and imaging; there’s so much "flavor" in this film that I couldn’t recommend this enough to anyone who wants to see a film that stimulates the mind, imagination and one’s sense of cultural amalgamation.
RECOMMENDATIONS: I’m assuming, by the way, that this was rated R on its initial, heavily-edited 1991 release, due to nudity, language, and sex. The initial release was roundly panned by critics and the box office, and so Wenders re-released the film as the "Director’s Cut" trilogy which I’m currently viewing. The director’s cut is not available on DVD in North America, so the next best solution for viewing this film is through BitTorrent. Finally, the film uses English, French, Japanese, Chinese, and German dialogue throughout the film, and English subtitles are available for viewing in the BItTorrent release.
PS: The song by U2, also titled "Until the End of the World" was initially included on the film soundtrack before it was re-recorded for their 1991 album "Achtung Baby".
