20/05/2005

We met Wim Wenders and Sam Shepard in Cannes, respectively director/screenwriter and screenwriter/actor of Don't Come Knocking [+see also:
trailer
film profile]. The duo gathered again twenty years after the Palme d’Or for Paris Texas. Here are some of their feelings on the film presented this year in Competition.

Family
Wenders: The question of family breaking up is general and affects everyone. Many people suffer from their parents’ abandon. I don’t know if the problems related to family relationships have political implications. I certainly wouldn’t like to have a president whose father was a president himself.

Shepard as an actor
Wenders: To have Sam Shepard in front of the camera has always been my dream as a filmmaker. At the time of Paris, Texas I begged him to interpret the film but he refused. This time I didn’t even have to ask him, he immediately proposed himself as the main character. The comic aspects of the film scared me a bit but he did very well.

Writing
Shepard: When I write I don’t think in terms of themes but of characters. Characters make the story. I make a character and I try to keep him close to the real world, to make him credible. The main character in the film feels his life is void, he tries to fill it by gathering his family again but it’s impossible.

Women
Wenders: Women are the true characters; the male character realizes that women are part of his life and that women are strong. Isn't it like that in real life?

Landscape
Wenders: with Sam Shepard I share my passion for Westerns. We knew from the beginning where the film would be shot. Montana, Utah, Nevada. But the Monument Valley is now soulless. I grew up in Germany watching films that showed the landscapes of the West. I fell in love with them. When I visited them for the first time I knew it was the ideal place, the one where I would feel at home. These are a Universal heritage, they belong to everyone.

Cinema
Shepard: Sarah Polley said: "I prefer cinema to real life." So many people live the films they watch. And that scares me.