Alice in the Cities
Films that shaped it
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Easy Rider was like a hammer for all European filmmakers at the time. It really blew our minds... It gave me the freedom to make films like 'Alice in the Cities' and 'Kings of the Road' where you literally follow a road and a character, and you don't need a plot. That freedom, I owe to 'Easy Rider'.
Films it shaped
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I was drawn to the German New Wave directors like Fassbinder, Herzog and Wenders. The big films for me were Kings of the Road, Alice in the Cities, and The American Friend. I was just so taken with Wenders’ quiet observation, and the way he took on American culture through a German lens which I found fascinating as an American trying to find stories here.
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When I was a student I was very interested in the German New Wave, directors like Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, and Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Wenders was one of my favorites, and I was particularly struck by Alice in the Cities and Kings of the Road, which have this beautifully melancholic atmosphere and a sort of freedom to them. They were like poetic documentaries of Germany, and I remember thinking, 'I want to make a movie that has that feeling about America.' That was part of the genesis of Stranger Than Paradise.
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Mr. Baumbach cited influences, including French new wave films by Truffaut and Eric Rohmer, as well as German new wave films like Wim Wenders’s 'Alice in the Cities' and 'Kings of the Road,' both of which feature young drifters looking for connection.
