Cheap City of Angels (DVD) (Nicolas Cage, Meg Ryan) (Brad Silberling) Price

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Customer Reviews of City of Angels

That is Seth's (Nicholas Cage) answer when asked if he regretted giving up his existence as an immortal angel for a brief lifetime as a mortal human. Seth is an angel who has an insatiable curiosity about the human experience. He encounters Dr. Maggie Rice (Meg Ryan) as she struggles to save the life of the man Seth is about to escort "Home". When she appears to stare him right in the eye and declares "You can't have him!" Seth is shocked and in amazement tries to find out who this person is. The more Seth learns about Maggie the deeper he falls in love.

This isn't an "Angel" movie although it does touch on life and death, God and the Heareafter... It's a love story. A love that is pure and innocent, a love that builds between two people who see the inner beauty of each other and are willing to sacrifice it all for each other.

Okay remake of the splendid 'Wings of Desire'
Looking at a couple of Internet sites where viewers can write comments on movies they've seen, by and large "City of Angels" was written about in almost sacred tones. The underlying theme seemed to be that, if you didn't see the film as something spiritually enlightening, then you missed the point. Alas, I seem to be one of those who failed to see the movie as something special.

It's a fairly good picture, and one that should prove to be a decent night's entertainment. It is a romance akin to "Ghost".

The plot twist is that Nicholas Cage plays a guardian angel who becomes infatuated by Ryan's character. When he finds out that it is possible for an angel to give up their immortality and become human, he does so.

For American audiences, this transformation probably seemed to be a very original idea. In fact, the movie is a remake of Wim Wenders' 1987 film, "Wings of Desire". This won numerous awards, particularly for its cinemaphotography. Parts of it were in black and white, others were in color. Some sequences had splashes of color added to the black and white.

Because of the almost sacred attitude towards "City of Angels", I'll try not to be too earthbound in pointing out what I think are weak points in it.

First of all, angels are 'in' these days. That's fine with me, but there are angels and then there are angels. The ones in this picture are dressed in ordinary clothes and wear black trench coats. This worked well in the German version, which was far more symbolic. Frankly, in the remake they look both ordinary and a bit ominous.

Both versions give the female lead a career which is in some way death defying. The German heroine was a circus acrobat, which fit perfectly. She was an outsider and had a love of flight. "City of Angels" changes her to a heart surgeon. I suppose this change was made to give the character more control over life and death. It seemed plausible that an eccentric circus performer would believe her new lover used to be an angel. It's hard to envision a well educated and science oriented doctor believing that there really are angels, much less that one could choose to become human just because of her. Perhaps what made this idea so hard for me to accept was that casting Ryan as a heart surgeon is as believable as seeing Leonardo DiCaprio playing one of the stars of the World Federation of Wrestling. Had it been Jodie Foster or Meryl Streep, perhaps I could have bought it. And it is, by the way, Ryan's first big role since "Sleepless In Seattle" five years ago..

Nicholas Cage does make a superlative angel. In the last few years, he has successfully become mainstream. If you look at his small, lesser known films, you see that his acting range is wide indeed. His immense talent causes us to overlook the fact that it's implausible that an angel would want to experience the pain and sorrow we mere mortals endure.

The film is nicely photographed. While Los Angeles is called 'The City of Angeles', I know from having lived there for a long time that it's an unlikely place for such a spiritual event to occur.

The end of the film is heart wrenching, yet inevitable. It is Cage's performance that gives it, as well as the rest of the film, such impact. I do not mean to diminish Ryan's capabilities. My opinion is that she was miscast.

Wim Wenders is one of Europe's most creative and distinguished directors. Ironically, Brad Silberling, the director of "City of Angeles", only notable film is "Casper". As in the friendly ghost.

Something about meg ryan! 26th june 2004.
No affense or anything, but i don't like meg ryan. Her films are entirely boring, i think she as ruined herself abit by her surgery, and i would feel sorry for any pretty actress who had the same. God bless mine hasn't had anything done.