| Field | Details |
|---|---|
| Movie Name | City of Angels (1998) |
| Director | Brad Silberling |
| Writer | Dana Stevens, Wim Wenders, Peter Handke (inspired by the film Wings of Desire) |
| Lead Actor | Nicolas Cage |
| Cast | Nicolas Cage, Meg Ryan, Andre Braugher, Dennis Franz, Colm Feore |
| Genre | Drama, Fantasy, Romance |
| Release Date | April 10, 1998 (United States) |
| Duration | 1h 54m |
| Budget | $55 million |
| Language | English |
| IMDb Rating | 6.7/10 |
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CITY OF ANGELS is a romance about an angel named Seth (Nicolas Cage) who falls in love with a human, Maggie (Meg Ryan), a spunky and talented Los Angeles surgeon. She fights to save a dying man Seth has been assigned to escort into the afterlife.
Like some godlike creature from ancient mythology, Seth gives up his immortality and powers (to read minds, to move freely and instantly through space and time) to become human and (he hopes) marry her. Seth thinks angelic life is drab and envies the sensual experiences of human life, the joy of love and feelings. City gets its basic ideas and imagery from German director Wim Wenders’s memorable Wings of Desire (1988), and shares its basically sterile and untraditional take on angels.
They’re compassionate and protective toward humans, but function mainly as messengers for an abstract, unspecified higher power. They’re about as secular as possible for creatures usually thought of as religious hey’re almost like space aliens.
Their joys are mostly negatives: no pain, no fear, no hunger. Their rewards seem pallid compared to romantic love (Wenders’s angel fell for a lonely trapeze artist), which is the best we humans can agree on just now and for Christians is a hint of the wonder and joy of God’s love for us.
The American film (director Brad Silberling, writer Dana Stevens) is much more interested in the love story, less in the angels and their work. (Wenders had them listening patiently to human anguish, comforting an accident victim.)
Finally, there are the usual dilemmas with supernatural movies. Are they good because they’re kind of religious and stir benevolent thoughts? Or are they bad because they’re misleading, sentimental and weirdly anti-theological?
Wenders and his American emulators make us think about such issues and consider with deeper respect the human love we so often corrupt and waste. But on angel theory they’re not very sophisticated, except that they’re a cut above Michael and Angels in the Outfield. If it’s true that angels are always with God, then they’re unlikely to envy you and me.
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