Don't Come Knocking (2005)

42% of critics liked it
(100 reviews)
41% of users liked it
(23,825 ratings)

Director Wim Wenders and writer Sam Shepard, who collaborated on the award-winning film Paris, Texas, once again join forces for this dark drama of a man trying to turn over a new leaf late in life. Howard Spence (Sam Shepard) is a veteran actor who has been a popular Western star since the… More Director Wim Wenders and writer Sam Shepard, who collaborated on the award-winning film Paris, Texas, once again join forces for this dark drama of a man trying to turn over a new leaf late in life. Howard Spence (Sam Shepard) is a veteran actor who has been a popular Western star since the mid-'70s. Spence's onscreen image as a strong, principled lawman is a severe contrast to his life off the set, which has been dominated by drinking, drugs, and promiscuous womanizing. However, Spence has begun to find his hedonistic life a shallow existence, and one day, in the midst of filming his latest movie, he simply hops on his horse and rides away, eventually making his way to the small Nevada town where his mother lives. Mother (Eva Marie Saint) has little interest in seeing her wayward son after so many years, but she does share a recently discovered bit of information with him -- one of Spence's former girlfriends stopped by with word that she had given birth to his son years before. Spence borrows his father's old car and drives to Butte, MT, where he finds Doreen (Jessica Lange), the woman who was his lover years ago. Doreen runs a tavern where her son, Earl (Gabriel Mann), plays for the locals with his rock band; Spence is in fact Earl's father, but the young man has no interest in meeting his biological father, and shuts out Spence as the actor tries to get to know him. As Spence struggles to find some sort of familial connection in Butte, he makes friends with a young woman named Sky (Sarah Polley), only to discover she was also fathered by him during his rowdy younger days. Don't Come Knocking's distinguished supporting cast includes Tim Roth, George Kennedy, Fairuza Balk, Julia Sweeney, and Tim Matheson. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

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Rating, Runtime: R, 1 hr. 51 min.
Directed By: Wim Wenders
Written By: Sam Shepard, Wim Wenders
Genres: Drama, Art House & International, Comedy

In Theaters: Mar 17, 2006 Wide
On DVD: Aug 8, 2006
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

Critic Reviews

Bill Muller, Arizona Republic
The story is as meandering as it is self-indulgent.
Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel
The charm here is in watching Shepard and Lange, and Shepard and Saint play off one another, and the leisurely pace of the 'discoveries' that aren't really secrets in the first place.
Peter Howell, Toronto Star
Spence has much in common with Shepard and Wenders. They seem equally bewildered about what to do, other than spending nearly two hours demonstrating that Spence is a self-pitying fool.
Kate Taylor, Globe and Mail
Suffers badly from an emotional aimlessness.
Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press
Don't Come Knocking isn't noticeably relevant or insightful, even if you're able to suspend disbelief long enough to buy the idea of a western movie star in the 21st Century.
Steve Murray, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The kind of movie you stretch out in, wander around, and -- like the characters onscreen -- just let happen to you.
Fernando F. Croce, CinePassion
The bitterness of the playwright's vision is expanded by the director's fascinated fondness for American culture
Cole Smithey, ColeSmithey.com
Apart from an extraordinary scene of attempted reconciliation between Shepard and Lange "Don't Come Knocking" is an inflated drama that lies stagnate on the screen.
Anton Bitel, Eye for Film
hardly Wenders' most adventurous feature, although perhaps his bravest, dramatising not only the director's undoubted influence on the last 20 years of indie cinema, but also his increasing redundancy within it.
Joseph Proimakis, Movies for the Masses
full review in Greek
Richard Falcon, Sight and Sound
[It has] a terrific sense of place, something missing from much contemporary US cinema.
Enrique Buchichio, Uruguay Total
Wim Wenders y Sam Shepard (Paris, Texas) recuperan (en excelente fotografía y mejor música) una iconografía norteamericana al servicio de una historia sobre el desarraigo y la necesidad de recuperar vínculos largamente perdidos.
Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews
... is so meandering it can make a sober viewer into a drunk.
Ed Gonzalez, Slant Magazine
The underrated Don't Come Knocking is possibly Wenders's best film since Paris, Texas.
James Plath, Movie Metropolis
There isn't a lot of plot in Don't Come Knocking, but interesting characters and strikingly memorable settings more than make up for any slightness in narrative.
Rob Thomas, Capital Times (Madison, WI)
The widescreen visual poetry of "Don't Come Knocking" seems less like inspiration and more like overcompensation.
Urban Cinefile Critics, Urban Cinefile
The story, jointly cooked up, is reasonable, if not their best, but Shepard's screenplay is a real disappointment, failing to lock into gear at any time.
Geoff Andrew, Time Out
By the time we get to the point where the camera is endlessly circling Shepard sitting on a sofa in the middle of the street, it feels as if he and his director were making things up as they went along.
Todd Jorgenson, Denton Record Chronicle (TX)
...the long-awaited reunion of writer-actor Sam Shepard and German filmmaker Wim Wenders yields only mixed results.

Read all 19 critic reviews

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Featured Audience Ratings

Anthony L

The mood and pace of the film is classic Western, but for me something wasn't quite right, the balance was just a little to tilted. I understood the symbolism between Tim Roth's character and Sam Shepard protagonist but I didn't think there was anything new here,… More
The mood and pace of the film is classic Western, but for me something wasn't quite right, the balance was just a little to tilted. I understood the symbolism between Tim Roth's character and Sam Shepard protagonist but I didn't think there was anything new here, nothing that hadn't been done before. Strange for a Wenders film really - A far cry from the great Paris, Texas anyway - the poor performances from Gabriel Mann and Fairuza Balk didn't help either but strangely, I did kind of like it, although I'm cetainly not mad about it.
Daniel P

Very impressed with this film. A great anti-Western, it's depicting a world outside of the Western genre still shot in, basically, the Western genre. The leading man echoes Clint Eastwood in a way - Clint's got six children by a few different women - and you can't help… More
Very impressed with this film. A great anti-Western, it's depicting a world outside of the Western genre still shot in, basically, the Western genre. The leading man echoes Clint Eastwood in a way - Clint's got six children by a few different women - and you can't help but ask what that's like when the on-screen cowboy has an off-screen cowboy story of a life to live. Utah, Nevada and Montana look beautiful and desperate in this film, and though it starts off sort of comically, it becomes clear that there is a lot of pain in these characters. Well-acted and well-shot, if not an example of super writing, I'm still hearing that Don't Come Knocking isn't one of Wim Wenders' best. It's the first of his movies I've watched, and it's opened my eyes to his oeuvre nevertheless. Coming from Germany, it blows my mind that he can tell a wonderfully American story like this one, but thanks to this film I'll be sure to visit Paris, Texas shortly. Lots of meta-film going on here, too: how many movies are actually filmed in Bute, Montana? Import Sam Shepard, Jessica Lange, Sarah Polley et al to the town, and you have to wonder if it could have had a real effect on the town akin to the one the main character's film did within the story... probably not, but it's a question that makes it interesting. It's hard to say much about this movie without spoiling it, and it does move really slowly, but I was hanging off it the whole way - suffice to say that in a later scene, why the White Stripes make sense to America, the world and me was hammered home, which might've made the movie in itself. The style and the chase at the heart of the story seemed like an inspiration for No Country For Old Men, too... at any rate, in my opinion, this is a film (and probably a director) not to be missed.
Pierluigi P

The poetic journey of an aging cowboy who seeks for redemption and forgiveness. Wenders lyric take on an existencial drama, with exceptional and touching performances by Sam Shepard, Jessica Lange and Sarah Polley.
Walter M

[font=Century Gothic]In "Don't Come Knocking", movie star Howard Spence(Sam Shepard, who also wrote the screenplay) rides a horse away from his latest picture, not quite into the sunset, leaving the crew in the lurch. Where he does end up eventually is the home of his… More
[font=Century Gothic]In "Don't Come Knocking", movie star Howard Spence(Sam Shepard, who also wrote the screenplay) rides a horse away from his latest picture, not quite into the sunset, leaving the crew in the lurch. Where he does end up eventually is the home of his mother(Eva Marie Saint) in Elko, Nevada. While getting into his usual trouble, he finds out about the son he fathered 25 years previously while working on a film in Montana.(He was probably having too much fun to keep up with the tabloids.)[/font] [font=Century Gothic][/font] [font=Century Gothic]And lukewarm on his trail is Sutter(Tim Roth), an employee of the film's insurance company, who is after Spence to complete the film.[/font] [font=Century Gothic][/font] [font=Century Gothic][/font] [font=Century Gothic]"Don't Come Knocking" is an intriguing, slow and anachronistic(the filming of westerns regretfully being few and far between these days) movie that is reminiscent of "The Electric Horseman." The photography of the American West especially of Butte, Montana is beautiful. However, the movie does not live up to its full potential. Some of the fault lies with Sam Shepard who gives a wooden performance in the lead.(I know Spence is supposed to be sleepwalking through life but this is taking it a little too far.) But there is an eclectic cast, with Tim Roth and Sarah Polley coming off best, and a classic scene involving a couch.[/font] [font=Century Gothic][/font] [font=Century Gothic]The movie is mostly concerned with the difference between the world of movies and the real world. In the movies, we prefer our heroes to be pure and untainted whereas in real life, people are much more complex and flawed. Take Howard Spence, for example, who made a career of playing heroes in westerns while living a rather imperfect life off screen. [/font]
Dimitris S

Faraway,so close dear Wenders...it's a shame,really,to stuck en route for the American dream as you say in all your filmography,discovering the core and then self-exploding?A pity,this was the pinnacle of Wenders' journey.I believe it's about time to pick up the rest of… More
Faraway,so close dear Wenders...it's a shame,really,to stuck en route for the American dream as you say in all your filmography,discovering the core and then self-exploding?A pity,this was the pinnacle of Wenders' journey.I believe it's about time to pick up the rest of the pieces and think of concrete ideas instead of dead end road trips.I wish I hadn't given one star on this but he wouldn't leave me any other option.Utter failure.
Leo L

An interesting movie! Sam Shepard is definitely one of a kind as he plays a Hollywood western actor. He's pretty much down on his luck, decides to disappear for a while. Through the absence, he realizes that he has a son somewhere. He goes in search for him, but in the end he… More
An interesting movie! Sam Shepard is definitely one of a kind as he plays a Hollywood western actor. He's pretty much down on his luck, decides to disappear for a while. Through the absence, he realizes that he has a son somewhere. He goes in search for him, but in the end he receives another surprise. Great music!! Fairuza Balk, Jessica Lange, and Sarah Polley co-stars.