The American Friend

Dennis Hopper and Bruno Ganz are superb in Wim Wenders's THE AMERICAN FRIEND, a gripping Hitchockian thriller based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith.

Jonathan Zimmermann (Bruno Ganz), a Hamburg picture-framer and painting-restorer who's suffering from an incurable blood disease, meets Tom Ripley (Dennis Hopper), an American who sells forged paintings in Germany and knows about Jonathan's illness. Because of a perceived slight when the two were introduced, Ripley spreads a rumor that Jonathan's death is imminent, and suggests his name to a criminal associate named Minot (Gerard Blain) who's looking for a non-professional hitman to dispose of his rivals. Jonathan ...