Wim Wenders: Pina
Tags: paris, dancer, film, indie, texas, Wim Wenders, Wings of Desire, Pina, Pina Bausch
One of my favorite kinds of interviews is when I end up just talking with a filmmaker about what movies they like. That’s exactly how it went when I interviewed Wim Wenders, one of the original icons of the indie film movement. Having made movies since the ‘60s, Wenders has seen a lot of world cinema firsthand. His impact peaked in the ‘80s when Paris, Texas and Wings of Desire captivated arthouse cinemas. He’s made music videos for U2 and pretty much a movie a year, 33 in all plus shorts, television and segments in anthology films.
Wenders’ latest movie is worth discussing too. Pina is a documentary profile of the dancers in Pina Bausch’s company. Bausch unfortunately died before filming was finished so she herself could not be in the film more. Shot in 3D, Wenders captures her dancers occupying real space in their avant-garde performances.
Over a cup of coffee one morning during the AFI Film Festival in Los Angeles, Wenders sat with me to talk about Pina. In a quiet, unassuming German accent, Wenders revealed his art with a confidence and vulnerability. If you’re interested in dance or just looking for some obscure movie recommendations, here is my candid chat with Wim Wenders.
SuicideGirls: How did the screenings at AFI Fest go?
Wim Wenders: We could have sold 10 I think. We sold out completely. I don’t know if that’s normal but I was told it was not. Both times were a standing ovation. It was very overwhelming and long talks with the audience. They loved it. Very emotional.
SG:
Is that a particularly rewarding group of audience and filmmakers to speak to at the American Film Institute?
WW:
Yeah, it was a great audience. Even yesterday at four o’clock in the afternoon, the second screening, a beautiful day, it was packed. They had to send people home.
SG:
As a filmmaker, do the dancers do a lot of the work for you?
WW:
Absolutely. Absolutely because I’m not a choreographer and I didn’t want to interfere in any way with what they can do so well, what they had done for 30 years with Pina. I took it for granted they were going to be as honest with me as they were with Pina. For Pina, the honesty of the performance was more important than the perfection. Pina was not interested in perfection. Her aim was that everybody was as truthful to himself or herself as possible and I hope that they were. I was just hoping they were going to be as truthful with me as they were with Pina and not be too impressed with the camera.
SG:
I think I agree with her philosophy. When I watch competition shows, I enjoy the ones who don’t look or sound like everyone else. They get eliminated for imperfections but I find them so much more interesting.
WW:
Pina’s dancers are like common humanity. It’s not like in any other dance group where it ends at a certain page or where you have these athletic superhuman beings. Pina’s dancers are short and tall and young and old, skinny and some of them very voluptuous. They are common humanity. Pina wants them to be themselves as much as possible. There’s no role playing. They don’t pretend to be anything [other] than what they are. They don’t play nude parts. They wear clothes. Pina’s universe is very unique in the dance world.
SG:
How did you choose the real world locations that some of the performers would dance in?
WW:
I knew what they were dancing because we selected these dance responses to my questions about Pina. We selected them together so I knew what they were going to show me, trying to find a place, a specific place for each of these solos in the city, in the middle of traffic, in public places, in the forest and parks and industrial landscapes. I tried to find something that would bring out the best of each of them and really could help them to show me something very special so that the places also become a character.
SG:
How did you place the camera to find the best three dimensional frame?
WW:
I had to know all of the pieces by heart. I had to know them all by heart because it changes, it shifts. There’s lots of sequences that from one second to another you have a whole different image. So you have to know at any given moment where the best point of view is to bring up the architecture of the choreography. I knew all of these pieces that we shot completely by heart and I had little models where I could place my imaginary camera, because in 3D you organize the entire space into three ways, not just a two dimensional flat image. So you really have to imagine the entire space behind the dancers as well.
SG:
I always admire a dancer’s physique. What do you admire about a dancer’s body?
WW:
What I admire is that Pina brought out the mot common language we all share on this planet which is the language of our bodies which most of us do not know. Pina brought out this language and really refined it and showed us a whole anthology of body movement, body language, a whole anthology we’ve never seen before, before Pina. We’ve never felt so much that we really have it in common. When I saw my first piece by Pina, my brain didn’t understand it but my body completely understood it. That’s what was so emotional for me and I wept through the entire piece because I felt I was connected. Until then, I was never concerned with dance. It didn’t touch me. It was an aesthetic thing. I thought that’s for others, not for me. With Pina, I felt this really spoke to me and my body totally understood everything. That is a very, very unique thing of Pina’s approach to dance.
SG:
How different would the film have been if Pina had lived?
WW:
The one thing that would’ve remained are the four pieces that are the backbone of my film now. The four pieces would have been the same. Everything else would’ve been different. All the solos by the dancers, all the outdoor shots, none of this was planned. With Pina my main interest was to shoot Pina’s eyes at work. We would have shot rehearsals, we would have shot the corrections the next day after each performance and we would have most of all traveled with Pina and the company and accompanied them on two tours to southeast Asia and South America. That would’ve been the bulk of the film. Pina would’ve been at the center of the film all the time.
SG:
You were at the forefront of independent cinema in the ‘80s. For a whole new generation of moviegoers, what would you like them to know about your work?
WW:
It’s more of an attitude that I’d like them to know. It’s more that film is a way of expression and film is a way of exploring the world and also a way to be honest with the world and with yourself. I always figured it was a very privileged way of living and working because while making a movie you can find out things about the world or in this case, I didn’t know much about dance. I didn’t know anything about choreography. I found out so much when I researched. I’d never been to Havana and to Cuba and I found such a rich universe, a joyful universe. You can make movies, even fictional stories, and use them as a way of exploring and that attitude is something I’d really like young filmmakers to get to know from my movies.
SG:
Why do you think some films like Wings of Desire or Paris, Texas were more popular or acclaimed? Is it because you were able to explore something more fully in them?
WW:
I don’t know. Of course these were much wider known. Wings of Desire was certainly in many ways a film that put my name on the landscape for many people. But I’m just as proud of, let’s say, Million Dollar Hotel or Until the End of the World that were also journeys into the unknown in many ways. It’s funny as a filmmaker, I’ll tell you the truth. It’s not necessarily the famous movies that appear on these 100 best lists and stuff, but it’s the ones that didn’t really cut the cake that are closest to your heart. For me Until the End of the World and Million Dollar Hotel are some of my own favorites but I know they never were commercial successes but I think they succeed in their own way. I’m happy with them.
SG:
Is that like Pina’s philosophy that it’s the flaws and messy mistakes that give it soul?
WW:
Totally. My favorite movies of other people are not flawless. They have flaws and the flaws give them their taste.
SG:
What are some of those favorites?
WW:
Ah, like Scorsese, my favorite Scorsese movie is The King of Comedy where DeNiro plays the comedian. It’s on nobody’s Scorsese list but for me it’s the greatest movie ever made. I know every second by heart. For me it’s a perfect movie and it has flaws all over but that’s what makes it so beautiful. It’s the same with most of my favorite filmmakers. Their flawless movies are strangely, if they’re perfect, there’s nothing in them.
SG:
You know, I sometimes find Kubrick movies cold because they’re so “perfect” I don’t feel anything.
WW:
But my own Kubrick favorites are also more flawed.
SG:
2001[/i[ is my favorite Kubrick movie.
WW:
Yeah, that’s my favorite movie period.
SG:
I thought The King of Comedy was your favorite ever.
WW:
That is my favorite Scorsese. My favorite movie period, the one that I’ve seen more often than anything is The Rules of the Game by Renoir but right afterwards is 2001. Again, in terms of structure and God knows what, it has many flaws.
SG:
What do you perceive as the flaws of 2001?
WW:
In terms of it takes an eternity to expose the story. It takes so long and the end flows out, just sort of evaporates into nothingness. I think if the movie was made today, every story department of every major studio would say, “Come on. You’ve got to be kidding.”
SG:
It’s funny, I’ve never even tried to interpret the final segment. I just watch the images.
WW:
And each time I see it I think, “Wow, the guts to do that. The guts to just do it.” You imagine it as a script and nobody would sign this, “Let’s shoot this.” Everybody would say, “Come on, Stanley. Write a script.”
SG:
I’m not as familiar with King of Comedy. What are the flaws you love?
WW:
Maybe its the Jerry Lewis character. It’s strangely discombobulated. I don’t know what it is. It has a rhythm that it goes up and down and up and down. The character that DeNiro is playing so hopelessly likeable and unlikeable at the same time.
SG:
When your films are commercial successes, is that still on an intimate level in the indie world?
WW:
I’m sometimes amazed. I do travel a lot and people come and say, “Hey, my favorite movie of all times is Kings of the Road.” There is a young man, he wasn’t even born when I made that movie. I wonder how he picked this one. Or the other day, all these young people love Million Dollar Hotel. It had been a revelation for them and it was a financial disaster. It was really a flop. For them it was the greatest thing. So we never know how these movies have their own life maybe sometimes 10 years later.
Pina opens December 23 and expands on January 20.
Pina opens December 23 and expands on January 20.
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