Enchanting road movie

 ALICE IN THE CITIES (1974)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

The idea of searching and discovering the real America by traveling through the whole country by car is a romantic notion. Books, documentaries and films have always tried to capture such an idea ("On the Road" by Jack Kerouac is one of my favorite books on the subject). "Alice in the Cities" begins with a journalist who can't commit to write a single word of his travels for a publisher, yet he takes a bunch of Polaroids and none seem to capture what he actually sees. This journalist is lost and captures moments that he feels embody something about him, and then he runs to tell his fed-up girlfriend all about it. The truth is that there is nothing there and he yields little to no discovery of the United States. His Polaroids look like Polaroids that could've been taken by anybody. 

Wim Wenders' "Alice in the Cities" begins as a curiously remote odyssey, the story of a German writer named Philip (Rüdiger Vogler) who scribbles in his notepad yet has presumably nothing interesting to say. He hates television because of the commercials and that somehow the programs are commercials themselves - all interrupting each other and probably not having much to say either. His publisher is miffed that Philip did not write a single word, which was his assignment. Feeling lost once again, Philip decides to go back to Germany and never return. He runs into a German woman (Lisa Kreuzer) who is leaving for Germany after just having a bad relationship, but only tickets to Amsterdam are available. She has a precocious daughter (Yella Rottländer) and they befriend Philip who serves as their English translator and helps them. Eventually, the mother disappears and Philip is forced to help Alice, hoping the mother will return to Amsterdam. Instead Philip helps Alice find her grandmother though she can't remember what German city she lives in.

"Alice in the Cities" is extraordinarily moving yet never sentimental. As you watch Philip and Alice, who appear like surrogate father and daughter, you sense that this journey could be never-ending and perhaps Alice might never see her mother again. What is especially touching about the film is that it approaches Alice's own journey not as a mission but as a need for human contact - the girl is smartly aware that nothing is at it seems. Philip has his own journey and it feels just and with a singular purpose. When the two decide to take pictures in a photo booth, we see Philip smiling and finding some inner joy about life that moves him - perhaps forming his own family. When Alice takes a Polaroid of Philip, she finds his soul and he is touched. The movie along at a glacial though entrancing pace, like life. "Alice in the Cities" is enchanting.