Its concept of the fallen angel seems grounded to me by that illuminating presence of Nicolas Cage, but it lacks a few lights to reach heaven. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 6/10 | Feb 8, 2023

Everything the over-the-top Ghost should have been - stylish, endearing and, watching it now 23 years on, enduring - City of Angels' only disappointment is that it didn't make even more of the Cannes-winning source material.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Nov 30, 2021

City of Angels is an exercise in rapt, soapy quietude — a hymn to sappiness.

| Original Score: C | Sep 7, 2011

Glossy romance as an angel falls for a surgeon.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 22, 2010

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 18, 2008

The movie's eerie, slightly menacing vision of black-clad angels lurking in the shadowy corners of unsuspecting lives is genuinely haunting.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 18, 2008

A good deal better than it has any right to be.

| Sep 18, 2008

Strains to achieve the enchantingly sublime, but ends up sinking to the depressingly ridiculous.

| Apr 27, 2007

As a remake it's not as poetic as Wenders' masterpiece Wings of Desire, but it's supremely mounted (by ace lenser John Seale) and contains touching performances from Nicolas Cage and Meg Ryan deviating from their respective screen images.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 1, 2006

Funnier than Wenders' version, and it also succeeds in visualising LA as a magical city while dealing intelligently with the themes of mortality, sacrifice, free will, and the mixed blessings of the human condition.

| Feb 9, 2006

An emotionally uninvolving flick that attempts to play on the heart strings of the viewer and fails in its effort.

| Original Score: C- | Apr 9, 2005

City of Angels is the sort of compromised movie that could have been almost good, but decided to be a great big hit instead.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Jan 2, 2005

City of Angels raises theological questions, albeit in a somewhat pedestrian manner, and makes them an integral part of its otherwise formulaic plot.

Full Review | Dec 6, 2004

Superb imagery can't compensate for deficiencies of Dana Steven's script and can't hide the formulaic nature of this film.

| Original Score: 4/10 | Jun 2, 2004

This useless remake lacks the sheer ethereal beauty of the original Wings of Desire.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 6, 2003

Why would anyone remake Wim Wenders' masterpiece, Wings of Desire? Certainly not for artistic reasons.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Aug 11, 2003

A thinking person's film for those who can't think.

Full Review | Original Score: 1.5/4 | May 20, 2003

A beautiful film in many ways.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Feb 8, 2003

Marries romance and faith in a love story as charming as a handmade valentine. It is so lovely to look at and so sincere in intent that its flaws don't matter much.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 15, 2002

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 8, 2002