New West Film Review: "Don't Come Knocking"

Wim Wenders’ ‘Don’t Come Knocking’ Makes Butte Outshine Even Sam Shepard

By Contributing Writer, 3-26-06

By Seonaid Campbell

To critique Wim Wenders new film "Don't Come Knocking" upon its Montana premiere would be to miss the point of the unique filmic experience enjoyed by the 1,230 plus people who packed the Mother Lode Theater in uptown Butte Friday night to watch as their town was reflected back to them through the eyes of the famous German filmmaker.

The audience loved it, but they had to work to love it. Severe technical difficulties with the projector, which could have forced the sponsors to cancel the event, continued throughout the show. The center of the screen was consistently out of focus, the audio was spotty, and the effect was sometimes nauseating.

Yet Wenders, who'd known of the projector trouble beforehand introduced his film with aplomb. "This is better than the Cannes Film Festival!" he said.

He then asked everyone who had worked on the film to stand up. A handful did. Everyone applauded vigorously.

In an awkward moment, Wenders apologized to the fifty local ladies whose portrayal of a manicurists' convention had been cut in final edit. A woman in the back of the audience let out a shriek of disappointment. "It will be my favorite chapter on the DVD's deleted scenes," he conceded.

Seeing the familiar, it turns out, was what the audience most wanted. "You will recognize cars, some will recognize houses, or themselves," said Wenders. "I hope you will forgive me," he added, acknowledging the locals' fierce loyalty to their town's image. (Click here to read more about Wenders' appearence in Butte Friday.)

Butte is the destination of the film's lead character, Howard Spence, played by Sam Shepard, who also wrote the screenplay. Spence is a Western actor, now past his prime, and given to drinking, who escapes the set of a two-bit Western, mid-filming. He makes his way from Arches National Park to Elko, Nevada, where he visits his mother, whom he hasn't seen in years. She reveals to him he has a son he never knew about in Butte, Montana. The quest is set in motion.

For the audience at the Mother Lode, these scenes did little more than delay the gratification they knew was coming. When Spence drove into Butte for the first time and parked in front of the beloved M&M Bar and Café, raucous applause broke out in the theater.

"This is surely the only film premiere where people cheer for a building," chuckled Butte native Ed Dobb.

The remainder of the story doesn't ring true, but that mattered less than the sight of Butte's urban-industrial landscape, romantically interpreted through the lens of Franz Lustig's patient camera. The familiar is viewed from unfamiliar angles. The color is lusciously saturated but soft and bright -- a sunny day at high elevation -- and the careful compositions are reminiscent of Edward Hopper paintings. A stillness settles over the shots of well-known landmarks -- the Anselmo Mine headframe, the Big M, the Berkeley Pit, other back alleys, street corners, and, of course the M&M -- that makes getting back to the action of the story seem almost unnecessary.

In those moments we all forgave the blurry screen.

The camera clearly loves the town and the audience was right to focus on their place. Wenders had made Butte the most compelling character in the film.

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