Wim Wenders

Wim Wenders
Wim Wenders, 2005
Born	Ernst Wilhelm Wenders
Occupation	Film director
Years active	1967–present
Spouse(s)	Edda Köchl (1968–74) Lisa Kreuzer (1974–78) Ronee Blakley (1979–81) Isabelle Weingarten (1981–82) Donata Wenders (1993–)
Awards	Silver Bear Jury Prize 2000 The Million Dollar Hotel Golden Palm 1984 Paris, Texas Best Director Award (Cannes Film Festival) 1993 Faraway, So Close! Golden Lion 1982 The State of Things
Website	http://www.wim-wenders.com/

Ernst Wilhelm "Wim" Wenders (born 14 August 1945) is a German film director, playwright, author, photographer and producer.

Early life

Wenders was born in Düsseldorf. He graduated from high school in Oberhausen in the Ruhr area. He then studied medicine (1963–64) and philosophy (1964–65) in Freiburg and Düsseldorf. However, he dropped out of university studies and moved to Paris in October 1966 to become a painter. Wenders failed his entry test at France's national film school IDHEC (now La Fémis), and instead became an engraver in the studio of Johnny Friedlander, an American artist, in Montparnasse. During this time, Wenders became fascinated with cinema, and saw up to five movies a day at the local movie theater.

Set on making his obsession also his life's work, Wenders returned to Germany in 1967 to work in the Düsseldorf office of United Artists. That fall, he entered the "Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film München" (University of Television and Film Munich). Between 1967 and 1970 while at the "HFF", Wenders also worked as a film critic for FilmKritik, then the Munich daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, Twen magazine, and Der Spiegel.

Wenders completed several short films before graduating from the Hochschule with a feature-length 16mm black and white film, Summer in the City.

Wenders at Cannes, 2002

Career and awards

Wenders began his career with the rise of the New German Cinema at the end of the 1960s, making his feature directorial debut with Summer in the City (1970). Awards that he has received include the Golden Lion for The State of Things at the Venice Film Festival (1982), the Palme d'Or at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival for his movie Paris, Texas, and Best Direction for Wings of Desire in the 1987 Bavarian Film Awards and the 1987 Cannes Film Festival. Wenders was awarded honorary doctorates at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1989 and at the Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium in 2005. In 1993 he again won the Bavarian Film Awards for Best Director. He was awarded the Leopard of Honour at the Locarno International Film Festival in 2005.

Much of the distinctive cinematography in his movies is the result of a highly productive long-term collaboration with Dutch cinematographer Robby Müller. Some of his more successful and critically acclaimed movies (Paris Texas and Wings of Desire, for example) have been the result of fruitful collaborations with highly respected writers Peter Handke and Sam Shepard. Handke's novel, The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick was adapted for his second feature film, The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty and Handke co-wrote the script for Wings of Desire and Until the End of the World both featuring Solveig Dommartin.

Wenders has directed several highly acclaimed documentaries, most notably Buena Vista Social Club (1999) about Cuban musicians, and The Soul of a Man (2003) on American blues.

Wenders has directed many music videos for U2, including "Stay (Faraway, So Close!)" and a number of television commercials including a UK advertisement for Carling Premier Canadian beer. His book, Emotion Pictures - a collection of diary essays written while a film student - was broadcast as a series of plays on BBC Radio 3, featuring Peter Capaldi as Wenders, with Gina McKee, Saskia Reeves, Dennis Hopper, Harry Dean Stanton and Ricky Tomlinson, dramatised by Neil Cargill.

Wenders is also a member of the advisory board of World Cinema Foundation. The project was founded by Martin Scorsese and aimed at finding and reconstructing world cinema films that have been long neglected.

Selected exhibitions

2006

Wim Wenders: Immagini dal pianeta terra, Scuderie del Quirinale, Rome, Italy Journey to Onomichi – Photos by Wim and Donata Wenders, Omotesando Hills, Tokyo, Japan Pictures from the Surface of the Earth, images from touring exhibition, Salon of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade, Yugoslavia Dark Places, curated by Joshua Decter, Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, CA

2005

The Forest: Politics, Poetics, and Practice, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC Through the Lens, group exhibition, C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, MD

2004–05

Pictures from the Surface of the Earth, ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Århus C, Denmark

2004

Pictures from the Surface of the Earth, Australia and Japan, James Cohan Gallery, New York, NY Between The Lines, group exhibition, James Cohan Gallery, New York, NY Images of Time and Place: Contemporary Views of Landscape, group exhibition, Lehman College Art Gallery, Bronx, NY Wim Wenders, Galleria Marabini, Bologna, Italy Through the Lens: Eight Photographers, group exhibition, C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore, Maryland.

2003

Wim Wenders, James Cohan Gallery, New York, NY Wim Wenders, Galerie Judin Belot, Zurich, Switzerland

2000–04

Pictures from the Surface of the Earth, touring exhibition: Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2001), Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao (2002), Haunch of Venison, London (2003); Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (2003); City Art Gallery, Wellington, New Zealand; Millennium Art Museum, Beijing, China; Shanghai Museum of Art, Shanghai, China; Guangdong Museum of Art, Guangzhou, China (2004)

2000

Buena Vista Social Club, Rose Gallery, Bergamot Station, Santa Monica, CA

1996

Wim Wenders: Landscape and Memory, Gallery of Contemporary Photography, Santa Monica Wim Wenders: Photos, in conjunction with the publication, Wim Wenders: Photos, Munich Goethe Institute (1996), Goethe Institutes worldwide

1995

Wim Wenders: Landscape and Memory, Gallery of Contemporary Photography, Santa Monica, CA

1993–95

Wim Wenders Photo Exhibition, in conjunction with the publication, Once, Munich: Schirmer/ Mosel (2001), touring exhibition: Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome (1993); Villa delle Rose, Bologna (1994); FNAC, Paris (1994); Parco, Tokyo (1994); FNAC, Berlin (1995); Villa Rufolo, Ravello (1995)

1989–94

Wim Wenders Photographs, touring exhibition: Galerie F. C Gundlach, Hamburg (1989); Galerie Marie-Louise Wirth, Zürich (1990); Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film, Munich (1991); Fahey/Klein Gallery, Los Angeles (1991); Shibuya Seibu Dept. Store, Tokyo (1992); Kiyomizu

1989–94

Temple, Kyoto (1992); Musée de L'Elysée, Lausanne (1992); Amerika Haus, Berlin (1992); Venice Biennale (1993); Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebaek (1993); Sala Parpallo Palau Dels Scala, Valencia (1994); San Telmo Museum, San Sebastian (1994)

1986–92

Written in the West, in conjunction with the publication, Written in the West, Munich: Schirmer/Mosel (1987), touring exhibition: Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (1986); Encontros de Fotografia, Coimbra (1987); Palazzo della Triennale di Milano (1988); Film Society of Miami (1988); Goethe Institut, Stockholm (1988); Goethe Institut, Copenhagen (1988); Saint-Yrieix-La-Perche (1990); Städtische Galerie Schwarzes Kloster, Freiburg (Breisgau) (1992)

Filmography

Year	Title	German title	Summary
1970	Summer in the City		First full length feature film (Dedicated to The Kinks)
1972	The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty (UK) or The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (USA)	Die Angst des Tormanns beim Elfmeter	Adaptation of a novel by Peter Handke
1973	The Scarlet Letter	Der Scharlachrote Buchstabe	Adapted from the novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne
1974	Alice in the Cities	Alice in den Städten	First part of Wenders' Road Movie Trilogy
1975	The Wrong Move	Falsche Bewegung	Second part of Wenders' Road Movie Trilogy, with Nastassja Kinski
1976	Kings of the Road	Im Lauf der Zeit	Third part of Wenders' Road Movie Trilogy
1977	The American Friend	Der Amerikanische Freund	Adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's novel Ripley's Game
1980	Lightning Over Water		Documentary about the last days of Nicholas Ray
1982	Room 666	Chambre 666	Short documentary interviews directors on the future of cinema, including Steven Spielberg, Jean-Luc Godard, and Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Filmed at Cannes
1982	Reverse Angle		Short film documents Wenders' disputes with Coppola during Hammett
1982	Hammett		Fictional story about Dashiell Hammett, American writer; based on a novel by Joe Gores
1982	The State of Things	Stand der Dinge
1984	Paris, Texas
1985	Tokyo-Ga		Documentary about Japanese film director Yasujiro Ozu
1987	Wings of Desire	Der Himmel über Berlin	Written with Peter Handke
1989	Notebook on Cities and Clothes	Aufzeichnungen zu Kleidern und Städten	Documentary about Japanese fashion designer Yohji Yamamoto.
1990	Red Hot + Blue		Music video for "Night and Day" performed by U2
1991	Until the End of the World	Bis ans Ende der Welt
1992	Arisha, the Bear and the Stone Ring	Arisha, der Bär und der steinerne Ring
1993	Faraway, So Close!	In weiter Ferne, so nah!	Sequel to Wings of Desire
1994	Lisbon Story		Partially a sequel to The State of Things
1995	Beyond the Clouds	Jenseits der Wolken	(with Michelangelo Antonioni)
1995	The Brothers Skladanowsky	Die Gebrüder Skladanowsky	Also known as A Trick of the Light
1997	The End of Violence
1998	Willie Nelson at the Teatro
1999	Buena Vista Social Club		Documentary about Cuban musicians; made with Ry Cooder
2000	The Million Dollar Hotel
2001	Souljacker Part 1		Music Video for "Souljacker Pt 1" by Eels
2002	Ode to Cologne: A Rock 'N' Roll Film	Viel passiert - Der BAP-Film	Documentary about the Cologne rock group BAP
2002	Ten Minutes Older		Contributed segment "Twelve Miles to Trona"
2003	The Soul of a Man		Documentary about Blues musicians
2004	Land of Plenty
2005	Don't Come Knocking
2008	Palermo Shooting

Selected bibliography

• Wenders, Wim (1984), Paris, Texas, Nördlingen: Greno, ISBN 978-3921568118
• Wenders, Wim (1986), Emotion pictures: Essays und Filmkritiken, 1968-1984, Frankfurt: Verlag der Autoren, ISBN 978-3886610785
• Wenders, Wim (1989), Emotion pictures: reflections on cinema, London: Faber and Faber, ISBN 978-0571152711
• Shepard, Sam; Wenders, Wim (1991), Paris, Texas: Screenplay, New York: Ecco Press, ISBN 978-0880012669
• Wenders, Wim; Hofmann, Michael (1992), The logic of images: essays and conversations, London: Faber and Faber, ISBN 978-0571165179
• Wenders, Wim (1995), Die Zeit mit Antonioni: Chronik eines Films, Frankfurt: Verlag der Autoren, ISBN 978-3886611621
• Wenders, Wim; Handke, Peter (1998), Der Himmel über Berlin: Ein Filmbuch von Wim Wenders und Peter Handke, Berlin: Suhrkamp Verlag, ISBN 978-3518024065
• Wenders, Wim; Wenders, Donata (2000), The heart is a sleeping Beauty: the Million Dollar Hotel - a film book, New York: teNeues, ISBN 978-3823854685
• Wenders, Wim; Hofmann, Michael (2000), My time with Antonioni: the diary of an extraordinary experience, London: Faber and Faber, ISBN 978-0571200764
• Wenders, Wim (2001), Written in the West, New York: teNeues, ISBN 978-3823854692
• Wenders, Wim (2001), Once: pictures and stories, New York: D.A.P./Schirmer/Mosel, ISBN 978-1891024252
• Wenders, Wim; Hofmann, Michael (2001), On film: essays and conversations, London: Faber and Faber, ISBN 978-0571207183
• Lindbergh, Peter; Wenders, Wim (2002), Peter Lindbergh: stories, Santa Fe: Arena Editions, ISBN 978-1892041647
• Steinhilber, Berthold; Wenders, Wim (2003), Ghost towns of the American West, New York: Harry N. Abrams, ISBN 978-0810945081
• Wenders, Wim; Tawada, Yoko (2007), Where Europe begins, New York: New Directions Publishers, ISBN 978-0811217026

Quotes

• "Sex and violence was never really my cup of tea; I was always more into sax and violins."
• "I consider Ozu my all time grand master."
• "I want to make personal films, not private films."

See also

• James Cohan Gallery

External links

• Official website
• Wim Wenders at IMDb
• Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database
• filmportal.de including biography, filmography and photos
• Wenders Bibliography (via UC Berkeley)
• Wim Wenders: Image and Cultural Influence ToxicUniverse.com article by Tony Pellum
• Interview with Wim Wenders Template:De icon
• Naked Punch Review interview with Wim Wenders (PDF)
• Wim Wenders to be part of "Global Town Hall" summit
• CNN interview with Wim Wenders
• Wim Wenders Interview (portuguese subtitles)
• Wim Wenders's Cinématon - A 4 minutes portrait by Gérard Courant (1982)