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He earned critical acclaim for directing the films Alice in the Cities (1974), The Wrong Move (1975), and Kings of the Road (1976), later known as the Road Movie trilogy. Wenders won the BAFTA Award for Best Direction and the Palme d'Or for Paris, Texas (1984) and the Cannes Film Festival Best Director Award for Wings of Desire (1987).
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- 'Until the End of the World' (1991) Starring: William Hurt, Solveig Dommartin, Sam Neill. Wim Wenders made a large-scale and ambitious road movie with Kings of the Road, but that one pales in comparison - when it comes to scope and ambition - to 1991’s Until the End of the World.
- 'Perfect Days' (2023) Starring: Koji Yakusho, Tokio Emoto, Arisa Nakano. As mentioned before, Wim Wenders has remained active as a filmmaker into the 2020s, with Perfect Days arguably being up there with some of the best releases of the decade so far.
- 'Paris, Texas' (1984) Starring: Harry Dean Stanton, Nastassja Kinski, Dean Stockwell. Another slow-paced yet absorbing movie about travel (perhaps enough to be labeled as another Wim Wenders road movie), Paris, Texas is one of the most beloved films by the director (and a favorite of director Akira Kurosawa).
- 'Wings of Desire' (1987) Starring: Bruno Ganz, Solveig Dommartin, Otto Sander. Wings of Desire is a fantastic fantasy film, and also one that has a good deal of bittersweet romance throughout.
- The American Friend (1977) Dennis Hopper plays an American expatriate in Europe, who convinces a German picture framer with a fatal illness to commit murder.
- Pina (2011) “Dance, dance, otherwise we are lost”. Wenders pays tribute to Pina Bausch, to some the most important choreographer of the last 40 years.
- Nick’s Film: Lighting Over Water (1980) Wenders gets to say goodbye to one of his heroes, Rebel Without A Cause director Nick Ray. A film of nostalgia, friendship, tribute, but, above all, death.
- Until The End Of The World (1991) Being this, a list of ESSENTIAL films, it doesn’t mean that all of them need to be good movies. Until the End of the World isn’t a bad movie either, it’s a conglomerate of all things Wim Wenders’ movies are.
- Paris, Texas (1984) Wim Wenders’ magnum opus, the 1984 masterpiece is a powerful exploration of the concept of family and human connection in the unforgiving landscape of the modern world.
- Wings of Desire (1987) Wings of Desire is an overwhelming study of the concept of alienation: from God, society and even from the self. The film was shot by legendary cinematographer Henri Alekan, who was also involved in Jean Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast.
- Alice in the Cities (1974) Loosely based on Peter Handke’s novel Long Farewell, this 1974 film is the first of Wenders’ famous road-film trilogy, followed by Kings of the Road and False Movement.
- Pina (2011) The 2011 film is Wenders’ poignant tribute to Pina Bausch, one of the most important choreographers of the last 40 years. Originally shot in 3D, the film is an immersive experience which introduces us to her intimate world and makes us understand what it is to live and to feel.
- The American Friend (1977) Wim Wenders’ finest achievement as a director is a sinuous, serpentine art-noir of the mind: a meditative descent into desolation and confusion, a rumination on art, intrigue, human frailty, and the eternal allure of the city after dark.
- Paris, Texas (1984) One of the most painful major films to ever see a release in America, Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas is a moral consideration of the limits of forgiveness.
- Alice In The Cities (1974) Last year’s Mike Mills-directed C’mon C’mon took more than a bit of inspiration from this wistful and endlessly charming masterpiece, the first official film in the Road Movie Trilogy and a high watermark of Wenders’ career to date.
- Kings of the Road (1976) In spite of being an epic film in terms of length, the soul-baring Kings of the Road feels at once like the Final Boss of Wenders’ Road Movie Trilogy, and also one of the most unvarnished and stripped-down things he’s ever made.
Possibly my favorite director, Wim Wenders has made about three dozen movies over the past 45+ years, and most of them are wonderful. He's the master of road movies, but he's also great in other genres and documentaries.
The dramatic tension in the blues between the sacred and the profane by exploring the music and lives of three of director Wim Wenders's favorite blues artists.
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