valleyjohn

Wings of Desire is a delightfully ascetic film . Who'd have thought 1980's Berlin could look so beautiful.

This is a love story like no other .

An Angel called Damiel decides he's had enough of being an angel and he wants to become human , to feel the love for a trapeze artist called Marion.

The dialogue is like poetry . Sadly poetry is not my thing so I struggled at times to keep up or even understand but the visuals were so good that really didn't matter as much as it should have .

The problem I have with the film is the whole Peter Falk/Columbo thing .

It feels like a distraction and completely out of place . Perhaps there is a significance to him being in the film that I just didn't understand?

Bruno Ganz is a fascinating actor . His face is perfect for cinema , especially in black and white . It's an arty film , too arty for my tastes at times but I can totally see how it was adored at the Cannes film festival .

Wings of Desire is a fascinating film that washed over me at times but I certainly had an appreciation for the art .

Guillermo del Toro Is one of those directors that can do no wrong in the eyes of most critics . I'm not buying that.

While I really liked some of his early stuff such as Blade ll and Hellboy , I thought Pans Labyrinth was overrated and The Shape Of Water and Pacific Ring were poor films.

Nightmare Alley is a partial return to form and probably the best thing he's done since Hellboy but it's still not without it's faults .

Bradley Cooper plays a man who joins the carnival and learns to manipulate people through mind reading deception . He later hooks up with a female psychiatrist played by Cate Blanchett who seems even more dangerous than he is.

Unsurprisingly for a Del Toro movie , this looks fantastic . The first half of the film which is set in the carnival is superb . You really do feel you have been transported into a world of freak shows and snake oil salesmen .

The second half , when Stanton ups his game and to tries to fleece the upper class , has the look and feel of The Great Gatsby and I didn't like it as much .

The story is a good one and I love the way it exposes that mind readers and mediums are frauds .

It cleverly shows you how these people prey on the emotions of vulnerable people .

Bradley Cooper is great and puts in the standout performance but Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette and Willem Defoe are really good too . The latter seemingly perfect for that carnival vibe .

My only real disappointment was the ending and that's probably more down to expectation.

I was lead to believe it had a bleak and shocking ending and while it's not a fairytale finish it wasn't half as grim as I hoped for .

I pondered on giving this 3.5 stars but settled on 4 . When I have more time to digest the film , that may change back .

This is a deeply moving film that follows the lives of two sets of parents who meet up to discuss a tragedy that happened in the past that resulted in the death of both their son's.

What a brilliant film this is . Four great performances from actors who are that the top of their game.

The subject matter is painful. One set of parents son was shot dead in a school shooting and the other are the parents of the shooter .

They discuss with each other whether they could have prevented what happened and even if they are at fault .

The tension is obviously high and the emotions range from guilt to blame to forgiveness.

This definitely has the feel of a stage play as it's four people set in one location but that's definitely not a criticism.

I love the way the parents try their very best , after the small talk , to be civil under very extreme circumstances and obvious tensions boil over at times .

There are two scenes that I absolutely love . One is after all the discussion and emotion the four of them go back to small talk after obvious relief that the meeting is over and the other is when Linda comes back into the hall at the end to tell one last story .

That performance alone , from Ann Dowd deserves an award .

Absolutely stunning .

The sad conclusion I came to after watching Mass is that there are teenagers all over the world that have the same mental health issues as highlighted here but it's only in America that they have access to guns and until that's addressed ( which it never will be) there will continue to be these awful meetings .