Paris, Texas - 7

If you have a Netflix queue or a list of films to see, this one must go on your list. This film is a collaboration of writer/actor Sam Shepard and director Wim Wenders (whose latest film, Don't Come Knocking, comes out next week). If I ever made a top ten list, with probably 50 films on it, this would be one). The cinematography alone is worth it (It was filmed in 1984, but looks like it could have been made in the last few years). The story works backward. All the relevant information is in the past for the characters, but it takes the whole film to discover how they have all come to this point. Travis, has been gone for four years, leaving his three year old son with his brother, who soon becomes like a father to him. Travis turns up in Texas and his brother comes out to get him and bring him home to LA. He then takes his son on a road trip back to Texas to look for his wife. Anymore of the plot would spoil it. The characters are so human it makes you enter the story, forgetting where and when you are. It is a heartbreaking tale, that shows how hard and incomplete our striving for redemption is. If you can't tell already I loved this film.
Trivia notes, the bands Texas and Travis (after the main character) got their names from this film. Wim Wenders also directed a number of U2 videos and Bono's film The Million Dollar Hotel. I suspect lines from The Joshua Tree album were swiped from this film.