PARIS, TEXAS is considered Wenders’ best-known and internationally most successful film. Celebrated by critics, it won a series of important international awards, including the Palme d’Or at Cannes.
This unconventional road movie is based on a script by Pulitzer Prize-winner Sam Shepard and tells the story of Travis (Harry Dean Stanton), a man who wanders out of Mexico and into Texas one day, in the blazing heat of the “Big Bend”. Travis does not speak a word. He also seems to have largely lost his memory. But he is driven by his wish to find his family again: his young wife Jane (Nastassja Kinski), whose life he seems to have placed in danger through his pathological jealousy, and his seven-year-old son Hunter (Hunter Carson). For four years Travis was thought to be dead. His brother Walt (Dean Stockwell) flies from LA to Texas to bring back his lost brother.
Walt and his wife Ann (Aurore Clément) have become Hunter’s foster parents. It is very difficult for the two of them to now give this role up again, especially when they learn that Travis wants to go out in search of Jane together with his son. They know nothing about her, except that she probably lives in Houston ...
In addition to the impressive performances by Harry Dean Stanton as Travis and Nastassja Kinski as Jane, PARIS, TEXAS has also become a cult film on account of the unique soundtrack by Ry Cooder.