Wim and Vigor

Director Wim Wenders can't bash L.A.

"I can't bash Los Angeles. I like it. It's a much better city than its reputation. You can't be enough in your car, so this city suits me," says Wim Wenders, sitting on a white couch in the study of his Hollywood Hills home, which is in the midst of a serious renovation. He is discussing his newest film, The Million Dollar Hotel, which is set in the Frontier Hotel downtown.

A look at love among the down-and-outs of Skid Row as the feds search for a possible killer in their midst, the film -- written by Nicholas Klein (The End of Violence) and Bono, whom Wenders has known since U2 were in Berlin recording Achtung Baby -- first gained notice on these shores when Mel Gibson, who produced the movie and acts in it, announced at a press conference that he thought the film was boring, a remark he later rescinded. Wenders bears him no ill will: "After 100 interviews with the Australian reporters and the press junket, to see the chance to have a joke in front of these Australian blokes, I can totally see how he could not resist it." Gibson, who, in Wenders' view, has "an amazing capacity to snap out of his character and start cracking jokes," may attract an audience that might not normally come to a Wenders film, but those folks might be confused.

Gibson's role as the uptight Agent Skinner is not only an acting departure for a man used to playing romantic leads and action heroes, it's also a mere supporting role in a film whose cast also includes Jeremy Davies, Peter Stormare, Bud Cort, Amanda Plummer, Gloria Stuart, Julian Sands, and Donal Logue. "I seriously, sincerely, and honestly cast Mel because he's a great actor and because we felt he was the best actor for the part," says the German-born director. "Only in hindsight, when the film came out in Europe, I realized people don't think he's an actor -- people think he's a brand name and therefore they have a certain right to a certain product." In order to reduce that expectation, Gibson is billed last in the opening credits.

At one point, the movie was going to be set in the future and involve virtual reality, but the budget proved prohibitive. Given the sci-fi influences of such previous films as The End of Violence and Until the End of the World, one wonders whether Wenders might ever do an all-out sci-fi movie. "I will do one one day," he says. "But I'm not so sure I want to make it a studio picture. I don't know if I'm the kind of guy who could be involved in that."

What does he think about City of Angels, the studio remake of his much-lauded Wings of Desire? While it outraged some critics, he says he was ready for the worst. "I thought they did a good job.... [Director] Brad [Silberling] wanted me to be in the movie, and I said no, include me out, because I felt it was better if it was totally left on its own. I feel strangely responsible for it, but not like a father, more like a grandparent." Wenders' next project: A writing collaboration with Sam Shepard, whom he last worked with on Paris, Texas.