Paris, Texas (film)

Infobox Film
name = Paris, Texas


caption = 1984 original film poster
imdb_id = 0087884
writer = L.M. Kit Carson, Sam Shepard
starring = Harry Dean Stanton, Nastassja Kinski, Hunter Carson
director = Wim Wenders
producer = Chris Sievernich, Don Guest, Pascale Dauman, Anatole Dauman
distributor = 20th Century Fox
released = flagicon|France 19 May, 1984 (Cannes premiere)
flagicon|France 19 September, 1984
flagicon|USA 9 November, 1984
flagicon|West Germany 11 January, 1985
runtime = 147 min.
language = English
music = Ry Cooder
cinematography = Robby Müller
amg_id = 1:37306
budget =

"Paris, Texas" is a 1984 film directed by Wim Wenders. The screenplay is by L.M. Kit Carson and Sam Shepard, and the distinctive musical score was composed by Ry Cooder. The cinematography is by Robby Muller.

The film stars character actor Harry Dean Stanton as Travis, who has been lost for four years and is taken in by his brother (played by Dean Stockwell). He later tries to put his life back together and understand what happened between him, his wife Jane (Nastassja Kinski), and his son Hunter (Hunter Carson).

The film was a co-production between companies in France and West Germany, but was filmed in the United States.

Title

The film is named after the Texas town of Paris, but no footage was shot there. Instead, Paris is referred to as the location of a vacant lot owned by Travis that is seen in a photograph.

The photograph shows a desert landscape, but in fact the real Paris rests on the edge of the forests of East Texas, far from any desert.

tyle

"Paris, Texas" is notable for its images of the Texan landscape and climate. The first shot is a bird's eye-view of the desert, a bleak, dry, alien landscape. Shots follow of old advertisement billboards, placards, graffiti, rusty iron carcasses, old railway lines, neon signs, motels, seemingly never-ending roads, and Los Angeles, finally culminating in some famous scenes shot outside a drive-through bank in down-town Houston. The cinematography is typical of Robby Muller's work, a long-time collaborator of Wim Wenders.

The film is accompanied by a slide-guitar score by Ry Cooder, based on Blind Willie Johnson's "Dark Was The Night, Cold Was The Ground."

Responses

The film won the 1984 "Palme d'Or" (Golden Palm) at the Cannes Film Festival. It was screened at the Sundance Film Festival in 1985 and again in 2006 as part of the "Sundance Collection" category.cite web|url=http://festival.sundance.org/2006/pdfs/SFF06%20FINAL%201.23.06%20-%20Sundance%20Collection%20release.pdf |title=2006 Sundance Film Festival Announces Films From the Sundance Collection | date=2006-01-23 |accessdate=2007-12-20 |format=PDF]

In popular culture

*Irish pop-rock group U2 cite "Paris, Texas" as an inspiration for their album "The Joshua Tree".Fact|date=February 2007
*Scottish rock group, Primal Scream, sampled Nastassja Kinski in the film for use on their critically acclaimed album "Screamadelica".
*Both Kurt Cobain [ [http://www.nirvanaclub.com/get.php?section=info/nevermind [NFC: The Internet Nirvana Fan Club ] ] and Elliott Smith [ [http://www.sweetadeline.net/32800chat.html sweet adeline | 03.28.00 chat at nme.com ] ] mentioned this film as one of their favorite movies of all time.
*Brooklyn-based band Nada Surf mentions the movie in their song "Comes a Time" from the album "The Weight Is a Gift".
*The last track of Gotan Project's second album "Lunático" is a cover of Ry Cooder's theme song for the film.
*Scottish group Texas was named based on the film.
*The Scottish band Travis is named after the main character of this movie and mention the film in their song "New Amsterdam" from the album "The Boy With No Name".
*Video game developer Goichi Suda named it his favorite movie in an IGN interview [http://wii.ign.com/articles/765/765721p1.html] .
*Australian band, Cog, have a song called "Paris, Texas".
*Francois Bovon was influenced to write Luke the Theologian after he saw "Paris, Texas".
*The film is mentioned by the comedy troupe The State in a skit on their MTV television series.
*Los Angeles singer/songwriter Fontaine, has a song called "Paris, Texas".
*Instrumental rock band The six parts seven have a song called "From California to Houston, on lightspeed" which uses audio samples from the film. The song's title is also an homage to the film.

References

External links

* [http://perso.orange.fr/forban/index.htm "Paris, Texas" fan site]
* [http://www.wim-wenders.com/movies/movies_spec/paristexas/paris_texas.htm Official website]
*

###@@@KEY@@@###succession box
title=Palme d'Or
years=1984
before="The Ballad of Narayama
after="When Father Was Away on Business"