Saw Until the End of the World, an extremely long film by Wim Wenders. Clocking in at 4 hours and 45 minutes, the film is sort of three small films put together. The three films are these:
1. A woman falls in love with a man by chance encounter. He is on the run and she follows him across the globe, country to country, trying to understand him and to save him.
2. A nuclear powered satellite loses control and is hurtling somewhere towards earth. Society reacts with terror and panic at this calamity.
2. A scientist develops a way to record and transmit dreams from one person to another.
Each of these films are interesting in their own right. Apparently the first one is a sort of inverted Odyssey, where Penelope becomes tired of waiting for Odysseus and goes out to find him herself. It's an interesting feminist twist on the Odyssey story and worth digging into. There's that theme of obsession and desire that films are so good at exploring.
The second film could be made into a compelling action film. There are interesting thoughts to be had about mankind's relationship to its own continued survival and mankind's relationship with its own weapons of war. I don't want to spoil this film too much, but there's potential for ruminations on the end of the world and the sort of legacy humans will leave too.
The third film I found the most interesting. There's some thoughts there about how technology both empowers and hobbles us, enabling us to things we could do before, but also limiting us in some ways. (eg: we now have cameras to do what oil paints used to, but now we need photoshop or smoothing filters to hide our flaws.) That's a whole topic unto itself.
Alas, this is not three small films but one big one. The same characters are improbably involved in all three acts and, to be fair, there is some foreshadowing and theming to tie these things all together. Apparently there was going to be a fourth act that also tied in to the frequent references to aboriginal ceremonies.
To add to this, it's directed by Wim Wenders whose films have never really been about the destination. Instead, his films amble along, enjoying the car ride and listening to some laid-back tunes. I feel like Wenders's work would really work best in a period piece. The slow contemplation would be more palatable to me if it were set in the 40s, where life was lived more slowly. Perversely however, this film is set in the future (ie: 1999). This is a slightly retro future however. There are public pay phones, but they are now video pay phones. Cars no longer play CDs, but they do use some kind of plastic card to play music instead. It's a strange choice that I think was only made for plot-fudging reasons.
So this film was not the greatest. It tackles many things. It does not feel rushed thankfully, but that is due to its length which is oppressive. The film feels like a long book or a heady dinner conversation that discursively stretches on, wandering through many themes. It's relatively interesting and intelligent, but oof I wish there were an intermission. Usually, I want to watch a quick movie before bed, not start a marathon! That is why this movie sat on my queue for so long.
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