The American Friend

A picture framer in Hamburg with a terminal illness is drawn by an American into committing a murder. In return there will be money for his family. The film stages the killings incompetently: two sequences, in a metro and on a train, built with a tension that is the opposite of professionalism. The narrative gives its real attention to the closeness that unexpectedly forms between the two men. Wim Wenders directed, with Bruno Ganz and Dennis Hopper. It is adapted from Patricia Highsmith's Ripley novels, and Nicholas Ray and Samuel Fuller appear in small parts. Who it's for: those who like slow, uneasy European thrillers. Who it's not for: viewers expecting the pace of the genre; this proceeds through long silences.