William Hurt Movie:

Editorial Review:
Shot on location in numerous countries, this ambitious Wim Wenders fantasy takes Sam Neill, Solveig Dommartin, William Hurt, and a ragtag group in pursuit around the world and back again. Though set in 1999 under the shadow of impending disaster as a wobbly nuclear satellite threatens to Chernobyl the planet, the leisurely gait of their worldwide escapades has a distinctly '40s-era decadence. The ultimate object of their quest is a machine that records visual information from one person and reconstructs it in the brains of others--granting the miraculous power of sight to the blind for one thing, but even more mystically, enabling a person's dreams to be recorded. When the film seeks resolutions on the most intimate questions of the human soul which dovetail with the possibility of a destroyed world, the film is hampered by the VHS running time, which subtracts several hours from the laser disc version. But numerous joys, not least among them Jeanne Moreau and Max von Sydow as Hurt's parents, inhabit this thought-provoking film. --Alan E. Rapp

Until the End of the World Reviews:
Great Movie - Bad Edit
2009-12-13 - I suppose there's no use complaining about the omission of character development when the full(er) version runs 4 times longer. This 2 hour epic is an intriguing adventure that spans the globe. It's part European drama and part Hollywood sci-fi, good-guy/bad-guy chases and philosophical assessment. The whole thing is a little over the top but lots of fun, James Bond eat your heart out.

A Classic
2009-09-04 - If you are new to this film, be warned that it's long. It's also a film buff's movie, packed to it's cinematic gills with homages and references. Those who love film will feel bits and pieces of Once Upon the Time in the West, Claire's Knee (and most other New Wave films), Bergman (Ingrid and Ingmar) and on and on. It would take many viewings to tease out the complex web of annotations. And then, you would have to do it again for the various versions of the film that have been released over the years, each one longer than the last. However, if you are a lover of Rohmer you will be happy. My advice for the first timer is not to watch so seriously, but to just let it play on a lazy Sunday afternoon and relax. Maybe work a jigsaw puzzle while you watch it. The style allows the movie to become a small world for you to live in for a few hours, and one that you will miss when the credits roll.

My real name is Samuel Farber ...
2009-09-01 -
This film, Until the End of the World (UTTEOTW), has long been called the ultimate road movie or even the greatest road movie ever made. Sometimes when I read stuff like that I cringe and think that this film is far greater than that and calling it a road movie does it a sort of disservice. I've watched this film probably hundreds of times (hate to admit) and in every different format available and have weighed this film, measured this film and only found myself wanting to see it again.

Sure, the film spans 15 cities and 7 different countries and has more story arcs than Los Angeles has McDonalds but the more I watch the film the more I feel that this is less of a road movie and more of a biopic of the fictitious would-be scientist, Sam Faber and his over-bearing family.

I feel that UTTEOTW is a much greater contribution to modern film then most are willing to admit and could quite possibly be one of the greatest films ever made. This film has the same kind of public ground swell audience that Casablanca, The Wizard of Oz and Blade Runner have. All these movies preformed badly in the box office but are seen as some of best cinema that man or woman has been able to bring forward.

UTTEOTW has been seen by many to be a failure of sorts because of the immense runtime and the resolution set in Australia that is almost an entire third of the film, in all versions. It seems, historically now, that the studio execs thought that it would be inappropriate to subject any audience to five hours of film and that the American audience was too daft and wouldn't buy the whole concept, thus kicking off the mess that the film has gone through for almost twenty years now. Yes, it has been almost that long now.

The film in different edits, according to lore, has gone from a 20 hour version, that Wim Wenders had vehemently held position on for almost six months before acquiescing to releasing a `meager' 8 hour version and then later produced a 5 hour version. He was horrified when the studio forced a 151 minute version that he looks back at in complete disdain and refers to as the `Readers Digest version' and has stated that it is `unwatchable'. I don't know about the 8 and 20 hour version and which is better, because I and many others have not seen it, but I have seen the 5 hour version many times and now look at it as vastly superior (in presentation) to the theatrical release, but the theatrical release is far from unwatchable and is actually the version that the majority of the audience is familiar with and enjoy.

Wenders suffers from the same ills as Ridley Scott does, as he sees his films his way and not the way the world sees them, and that's perfectly fine. Ridley Scott doesn't like the Harrison Ford `Philip Marlowe' narration while an immense group of the fans loved it, myself included. Wenders doesn't like the theatrical release while most of the world is awed by it.

So, when the audience did see this film, it was the beginning of a new decade and Wenders, like Werner Herzog or David Lynch, had built up a core audience of supporters worldwide that appreciated his films for storytelling, the movement and the sheer reverence that seemed to manifest on screen. UTTEOTW came out at probably the very beginning of the emergence of the modern independent film movement that has now firmly taken over the industry. Even though they had budgeted $23 Million dollars for production, a lot of the funds came because of the acclaim given to Wings of Desire again with Solveig Dommartin, but the money didn't necessarily make this film the typical large-budget studio film that others were producing around the same time for the same funds when this came out. A quick search of movies released in 1991 shows an abysmal year aside from Jonathan Demme's masterpiece `Silence of the Lambs'.

This movie is undoubtedly Wenders greatest work, and I have watched every film he's put out - before and since. Sometimes I see glimpses of this film in his other works and can tell that this film's reception in the world still weighs heavily on his mind. Like Al Gore, he's traveled the globe giving lectures with his film and has his own ideas about its impact and what more can be done. It seems that some of the legal battles may never go away, specifically the ones that are associated with Warner Brothers.

Recently, a Region 2 PAL version was released into the market, and when I watched it I could tell it probably didn't have the stamp of approval from WB. The quality shows it to be almost a straight VHS transfer from a low-end computer system which puts a lot of visual noise on the screen and in the audio. Some people who have purchased this version have complained, but really I don't see anything wrong with it as it's just a full-frame DVD that will suffice for now for those looking for the 158 min on DVD.

My recommendation when it comes to versions is to purchase the 3 Disc Director's Cut set from Amazon.co.uk and just live with the fact that the first fifteen minutes of dialogue that's had with Solveig and Chico are in French with no subtitles. If you watch the film you can pretty much get the gist of what's being said anyways, Chico needs more beer, he likes the Beatles, sex and Solveig tells you how much you can buy a goat for in Ethiopia.

I had read in January of 2007 that Solveig had died of heart failure and was deeply saddened as I found her to be an incredibly unique talent and hypnotizing to see on the big screen. I would have loved to have seen her star in a few more films and even break back into the American marketplace. What a shame she's now gone, she'll be missed for sure.

I've put a list of all the different versions below, that are available and that I own, so you could get an idea of what's going on with this movie and its debacle of a distribution:

1991 VHS Tape Theatrical Release 158 mins
1991 R2 Samsung Japanese Laserdisc 179 mins
2004 PAL R2 Italian 3 Disc Set 280 mins
2004 PAL R2 UK 3 Disc Set Director's Cut 280 mins
2007 PAL R2 UK 1 Disc VHS Transfer 158 mins

Regarding the last release, I recently discovered that the difference in the run-time is due to PAL speed-up adjusting it 4%, from 158 mins to 151 mins.

For those in America interested in seeing these films but are worried about the DVD Regions / PAL difference. Don't fret because there are some very easy ways to set your DVD player to Region 0 which will make your player Region free and you can watch all movies from around the world. Videohelp dot com has most players remote codes which will help you easily make the adjustment. I've changed all my players this way and have been happy ever since.

...

Where's The Region 1 DVD?!
2008-07-12 - I mean really - what's the holdup??? Seems like the rest of the world gets this on DVD but not the U.S.

Brilliant
2008-04-07 - I have seen this movie in bits on the Tele now owning it I look so foward to sitting thru it in it's entirity. A very large bowl of *hotair* popped corn...no salt but some garlic melted into the butter a mug of hot chocolate and the phone off the hook. A complex movie but wonderful concepts and insightful projections of the future, all twixed into an adorable - Love Story -