Episode 55: PARIS, TEXAS (1984) [feat. Jenny Ackerson]

Special guest Jenny Ackerson (@AckersonJenny) joins us for this extra-long discussion of PARIS, TEXAS! When director Wim Wenders and screenwriter Sam Shepard sat down to start PARIS, TEXAS, they wanted "to tell a story about America." The story they ended up telling was about Travis, an amnesiac reintegrating as if out of memory back into the deserts of the American southwest, intent on making his way back to a home he begins to remember breaking. By leveraging and breaking apart the western genre, blues music, the "love long lost" story, and the physical and mental landscapes of the American frontier, PARIS, TEXAS radically reshapes our notions of the scope, history, legacy, and future of the American dream. Just as Travis and Jane's story of remembered, shared, and repeated generational traumas slowly unravels, Wenders's masterpiece slowly shifts to unveil a subversive, essential new framework through which to view America, masculinity, love, loss, memory, and what it means to impose an idea on a place, a time, and a person. You can see why this episode is two hours long. Follow us at @trylovepodcast on Twitter and email us at [email protected] to get in touch! Theme: "Raindrops" by Huma-Huma/"No Smoking" PSA by John Waters.