Touched by an Angel

When a child was a child, he’d ask, why am I me and not you? In Wings of Desire the question comes up repeatedly and it provides the context of an angel with the keen aspiration to become human. Being an angel in this movie means complete altruism. Angels walk around the city to find people and help them. If an angel is on a train it’s not because he has a destiny, but because he locates a sad face on the train that can use some comfort.

Being a human, on the other hand, means the sensibility: the ability to taste, to feel, to touch, to be seen and to be heard; that is, to LIVE. Thus an angel is someone who is deprived of a life. An angel is an observer and helper of human lives, he casts his attention on people and nobody returns his attention because he is invisible and what he does is invisible. The supposedly poetic question turns out to be a corny complaint, “why me?”

That is where I start to feel regret for Wim Wenders. Despite making an original movie loaded with artistic images, he missed the possibility to deepen the story. He could have explored the dilemma of being an angel and a human by showing the inescapable sorrow and stupid worries of ordinary human lives, but instead he granted the converted angel with a life in which his dreams come true. Two ex-angels both seem happy with their choices and the other angel looks gloomy. What if the three of them reveal some self-doubt and contemplate on the “to be or not to be”, the ultimate question of being?

The trapeze once gets ridiculed about being an angel and the real angel standing beside her was shocked for a moment. As much as a puncture of laughter for the audience, it implies that the woman possesses a certain quality that can relate to an angel or allow an angel to relate to her. Unfortunately the film fails to build it up in the part and the actress fails to deliver the divine charm. And again I am thinking this, will it be better if the angel is not attracted to a woman and we don’t interpret his desire of being human in terms of love? What if the angel just wants to get a life and experience everything? Wouldn’t it be with great philosophical quality if he is driven to transform because he asks himself, “who am I and why am I the way I am?” Wouldn’t it be worth some thoughts if he makes the transformation a journey toward self-discovery, instead of a journey toward love?

I guess it’s not fair to comment on a film in a way that almost rewrites it. Let’s just say that it’s because an angel touched my shoulders when I watched the movie and he inspires me so much that he becomes visible to me.

--An old entry from an old blog

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