WINGS OF DESIRE
(Der Himmel über Berlin)

PARTS: ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN
NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY

Although the device of color cf. black-and-white film appears throughout the film, and is thus a key conceit, the recurring poem is the major device threaded through the film. The poem appears at five places, often in anticipatory harmony with shifts in the narrative. The handwriting that accompanies the poem's introduction, and the voice that reads the poem in all but one critical instance, belong to Damiel. To remind the viewer of this, at the end of the film, his voice-over, ending with the phrase "I know what no angel knows," speaks the words that he is writing -- which are written in the same hand and in the same notebook as the poem. This interlude underlines the sense in which creating one's own life, writing one's own story, resides at the heart of Wings of Desire. This also bridges the gap between the actions of angels (who write about others) and Damiel's actions as a person (who has begun to write about himself living a mortal, more consequential life).
The first portion of the poem appears in the film's first shot. Shortly thereafter, the poem's second part is heard while we see (through the angel's eyes) shots of children. The salient aspect of the poem, beyond its particular contents, is its celebration of the state of perception and knowledge that children posses. This is a state of perception open to possibilities, based on a lack of well-defined, experiential knowledge about the world. That is, this state of child-mind rhymes with the state of mind Wenders has attempted to create in the viewer through the exposition of the angelic point-of-view.

When the child was a child
it walked with its arms swinging.
It wanted the stream to be a river
the river a torrent
and this puddle to be the sea.
When the child was a child
it didn't know it was a child.
Everything was full of life, and all life was one.
When the child was a child
it had no opinions about anything.
It had no habits.
It sat cross-legged, took off running,
had a cowlick in its hair
and didn't make a face when photographed.

The key line in that first portion of the poem is the phrase "When the child was a child/ It had no opinions about anything." This is the state of mind that Wenders seeks to elicit in the viewer. It rhymes with the viewer's expectation, noted above, that "the narrative of the film, as with any newly encountered film, will not necessarily be clear." Then, in the second portion of the poem, the viewer is reminded of the questions that arise from such a state of being. This rhymes with "the confusion when, even after a half-hour, the [film's] narrative does not appear," also noted above.

The poem's third portion is heard during Damiel's second visit to the circus -- at the afternoon performance for children (slightly less than an hour into the film):

The fourth appearance of the poem appears during Marion's dream. This is different from the other sections of poem in that it is a repetition of a previous stanza and Marion, not Damiel, speaks it.

Damiel may plant the dream. Perhaps Damiel's words become hers. It appears unlikely that he simply overhears or sees Marion's dream. Some viewers may suspect that Damiel oversees her dream in a more deliberate manner, in the sense that he controls her dream. The notion that Damiel plants the dream, however, strikes me as closest to the film's intention. The metaphor of his seed growing within her, under her control, is apt given the nature of their eventual relationship. Certainly the case for angelic control of mortals is weak. There is, however, precedence for more ephemeral inspiration of mortals by angels. The despondent subway traveler who regains hope after Damiel's comfort is one such incident. The dying motorcyclist is another instance, akin to Marion's dream. Damiel nudges a sense of release or relief into the dying man's personal monologue by supplying a few generic, archetypal images to the man's conscious mind. This unleashes a series of more personal visualizations that move from the dying man's unconscious to conscious mind, and make the stream of consciousness his, not Damiel's. Similarly, while Damiel may play a role in its genesis, the dream is largely (if not entirely) Marion's. It is important to note that Marion adds her own words to the dream (in her own language), saying, "I want you to stay with me." When Damiel's poem appears in Marion's dream, it appears in Damiel's (primary) language, German, even if through Marion's voice. Marion's use of French can be read as a signal that she is creating the sentiment being expressed.
The fifth and final appearance of the poem occurs shortly after Damiel's fall. He gets some change from a passer-by, buys and drinks a cup of coffee, and goes walking.

This final part of the poem emphasizes the extent to which the grown child -- which is what Damiel is becoming -- can still recapture the childlike mind, the sense of awe that is most readily present in children. The implied meta-diagetic simile suggests that the viewer can recapture the child-mind in the project of -- or as the source for -- writing her own life's narrative. Phrases like "and they still do now," "And it is still that way," "the elation it still feels today," "it still is," "it still waits that way," underscore this notion. Previously, there was the one negative transmutation of the child's enthusiasm while playing to the grown child's sole excitement related to (only) its work. This point in the film after the fall, where this final portion of the poem is heard, marks the first time that the poem has bridged -- in a positive manner -- this gap between the child and the adult who can still posses the child-mind.

These essays are copyrighted © 1999 - 2001 by Nathan Wolfson (nathan underscore wolfson at yahoo dot com). Quotations from other sources are copyrighted by those sources, as indicated in the Notes and Bibliography. All rights are reserved.