ncweil This 2015 film by German director Wim Wenders, set in a Canada where each character speaks with a different accent, tells over a dozen years the story of a young man, writer Tomas (James Franco), who driving home stops just in time to avoid hitting a child who sleds into the road. He brings the wordless boy, Christopher (Jack Fulton), up to the house, where his mother Kate (Charlotte Gainsbourg) asks what happened to his little brother. The younger child, under the car, died. SPOILER ALERT! I will now to discuss the whole film. Over time Tomas recovers, and writes more novels. Occasionally he and Kate make contact. His relationship with Sara (Rachel McAdams) falls apart, and eventually he marries Ann (Marie-Josee Croze), a woman from his publisher's office, adopting her daughter, who's about the same age as Christopher. When the boy is sixteen (played by Robert Naylor), he writes to Tomas, by now a successful writer. After a confrontational phone call with Kate, Tomas agrees to talk to the young man, who's having trouble in school.Christopher accuses him of profiting from the accident - writing better, using the experience as material for his novels, faring better than Kate who still struggles to make ends meet. And he picks out a character in one of the novels and asserts that it is himself. Tomas, trying to maintain distance, explains that experience and imagination work together for a writer in ways not easily teased apart; he will not accept blame for the way their lives have turned out. When Tomas leaves after their conversation, the youth pursues him across an open space, then tells him to wait and fumbles in his backpack. We, and Tomas, are tensed for a weapon to come out of the pack - but instead, it's a stack of Tomas's books Christopher wants him to autograph. The moment could have gone another way - a bloody outcome all-too-familiar to the modern film-goer. These days, distant camera-shots of interiors through windows give us the sense of spying and stalking: impending violence.In the final scene, the night Tomas wins a writing award, Christopher, by now a college student, breaks into his house and urinates on his bed. When Tomas and his family get home, Ann notices the smell. Police come and investigate, but they turn up nothing. Ann and their daughter leave for a hotel, unwilling to stay where they feel violated and unsafe. As he darkens the house preparing for bed, Tomas notices a figure on his lawn. He opens the door wide, turns on his kitchen lights, sets out a soda and a bottle of beer, and sits. Christopher comes in, gets himself a beer, and they spend the night in conversation we don't hear. In the morning the young man is ready to leave. As Tomas walks out with him, they look at each other a long time. At last, Tomas embraces Christopher, who hesitates then hugs him back. Both are finally smiling as they go their separate ways.The viewer is drenched in what it feels like to have a stalker know where you live, your habits, your family and friends. This story is ultimately an antidote to that sort of creepiness. Instead of the anguished blood-satisfaction of revenge, the filmmaker shows how heartfelt and fearless reconciliation bring grace that heals.Wenders uses paired images throughout the film - during a phone call we see one speaker, then gradually in the other half of the frame the other, then the first fades, leaving darkness. Or we'll see Tomas and Sara in the same house, in different rooms, viewed from across the street - they look lonely. Wenders uses windows to look in on his characters, to expose them to the outside world, to bring light in to them (there's a beautiful shot of sunrise lighting Kate's rooms after Tomas has spent the night sitting on her couch while she sleeps, head on his lap, taking comfort in his wordless presence).Wenders also loves landscape, using it not just for mood but to give energy to scenes - after Tomas leaves Kate's house, he walks down her long driveway to where it Ts into the main road. This is the site of the fatal accident, but now it is summer, everything green and gold, and Tomas comes to where the road goes left or right, and takes one fork - no threat, no sense of death. When Christopher is a teenager, he bicycles through a field of handlebar-high yellow grass - behind him we see no crushed or broken stalks; only his gasping breath tells us how he has struggled.The presence of water includes the frozen lake where Tomas sits in a shack trying to write while his friends ice-fish, then the windy chop as Tomas and Sara stand gazing out, feeling they have lost each other. After one of his sleepless nights, Tomas stands by the shore watching a thunderstorm far across a lake. In a later scene, Tomas picks up his aging father to take him to a concert, but the old man, coming outside, sees light on the river through the trees and insists on going over. Father and son sit in a pair of chairs near the bank, looking at the water, holding hands, content.As he gets older, Wenders does more with less, letting images tell his stories. This film's use of color is in brilliant contrast to "Paris, Texas," where his camera wandered the vast drab landscape as though in search of anywhere to rest, a metaphor for the bleakness in those characters' hearts. It is as though he has decided fascination with nothingness is a young man's art - age pushes us to celebrate light, color, vitality while we can - we lose all this so soon.

dante-69329 My wife and I are movie buffs. Our times date back when films were only shown in B/W. But I'm writing this review, so I must speak for myself. I mention that because in my younger film watching years I would probably find this production from director Wim Wenders and writer Bjorn Olaf Johannessen as slow-moving, unexciting cinema. However with age, it isn't wisdom that necessarily arrives,but life experiences. The movie is about an accidental death of a child on a wintry afternoon. The driver of the vehicle, Tomas, played by James Franco, walks to the residence of the victim.... From this point on we become engaged with the child's mother, the driver's life, his relationships with his friends, his father, his agent (he's a writer) and other persons one meets. The film, as in life, just goes along at a slow pace, now and then highlighted by some excitement, tragedy, or a good event. You witness people through their various moods, faults, blessings, shortcomings,and behavior swings: in other words--- acting human. I highly recommend this film and consider it a cinematographic work of art.

Siebert_Tenseven This movie is an absolute delight for the senses. The cinematography and soundtrack are stunning. There are many jaw-dropping moments where one can't figure out how the lighting could be so gorgeous, and the soundtrack adds a level of beauty that lends tangibility to this profound story of forgiveness and acceptance. If you watch this at home, dim the lights and put the phone on airplane mode, because you don't want to miss a moment of this delicious sensual feast. If you are fortunate enough to be able to see it in 3D on the big screen, bring along your favorite loved one and share the experience.Did I forget to mention the director? Anyone who has followed the cinema of Wim Wenders knows of his unique ability to conjure a magic like no other. It's like looking through a window of his eyes, noticing the things only he sees, the feelings he only he senses. Obviously, this is not for everyone, and there are expectations of a more traditional form of storytelling for some. But the man is a poet, telling the things that can not be told, showing the things that can not be seen.It seems as though Mr. Wenders has used this magic with each of the actors, as there are many moments when one watches the expression of the mysterious emotions that emerge in this powerful story without a word. A true feather in the cap for James Franco, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Rachel McAdams. They each explore new techniques and territories in their acting, and work wonderfully with each other.

Howard Schumann According to German director Wim Wenders, "Landscape is never only landscape. It's also a state of mind… it has soul and then it evokes and reflects who we are." That state of mind is revealed in the chilly winter portraits of rural Quebec in Wenders' latest film Everything Will Be Fine, his first fictional feature in almost ten years. Shot in 3-D by Belgian cinematographer Benoît Debie, the film stars James Franco as Tomas Eldan, a successful novelist who is fairly comfortable but whose relationships are not nurturing, especially that with his girlfriend Sara (Rachel McAdams). Tomas' life is permanently changed, however, when an auto accident on a snowy road causes the death of a young boy and leaves the boy's brother Christopher (Jack Fulton and Philippe Vanasse-Paquet as a twelve-year-old) emotionally scarred and unable to give and receive love. suppressing outward expressions of grief, neither Tomas, Christopher, nor Kate (Charlotte Gainsbourg), Chris' mother, are able to achieve any release, especially Tomas who carries his unexpressed guilt around with him wherever he goes, like a chain around his neck. Though Kate, an accomplished illustrator, is forgiving, telling him repeatedly that the accident was not his fault, he internalizes his guilt and makes a half-hearted suicide attempt much to the consternation of his overbearing father (Patrick Bauchau). Franco delivers a sensitive performance as the conflicted author who is able to channel his suppressed emotions into his writing which become stronger and lead to long-awaited public recognition. As Tomas' career blossoms, he marries Ann (Marie-Josée Croze), a woman with a young daughter, allowing him to become a father for the first time. As told in a series of flash-forwards, Tomas develops a close friendship with Kate but his relationships with Sara and Christopher (Thomas Naylor as an adolescent) build towards a series of confrontations in which long held resentments explode. Written by Bjorn Olaf Johannessen and enhanced by the strong original score by Alexandre Desplatt, Every Thing Will Be Fine, though very slow and ponderous at times, is a humane, poetic and physically beautiful film. 3-D is used sparingly but scenes such as children riding on a Ferris wheel at an amusement park and dust particles dancing in the sun create a lovely tone. Though not in the top echelon of Wenders' oeuvre, the film's message of forgiveness and reconciliation stands out, sharply contrasting with the all too prevalent cultural mindset of violence and revenge.