Hello, movie friends. I'm Lily Percy and I'll be your guide this week as I talk to the Academy Award-winning composer Gustavo Santalaya about the movie that changed his life, Wings of Desire.

If you've seen the movie, you'll soon hear and understand the connections between the movie and Gustavo's own work.

But if you haven't, don't worry, we'll provide all the details you need.

Music But if you haven't, don't worry, we'll provide all the details you need. What if angels really did live and walk amongst us?

What if they were involved in our everyday lives?

They listen to us, they comfort us, they even put their hands on our shoulders in times of trouble.

But they don't actually show themselves to us.

One of my film writing heroes is Roger Ebert, and I love the way he describes the German film Wings of Desire.

He said the angels in Wings of Desire are not merely guardian angels, placed on earth to look after human beings.

They are a reflection of the solitude of God, who created everything and then had no one to witness what he had done.

The role of the angels is to see. We see a few angels all throughout Berlin in Wings of Desire, but the principal one is Damiel.

He's an angel who has spent all of his life watching humanity and loves humanity.

He loves every single mundane detail that makes us human beings.

And as he's watching the various characters through the city of Berlin, Damiel realizes that he is

no longer satisfied with just watching. He wants to experience what human beings experience.

He wants to know what heartbreak is,

what love is truly in a physical body,

and he decides to fall to earth and become a human man.

How long?

Venus.

Hours, days, weeks, months.

Time. I can give you a few dollars just to tide you over.

...