Don't Come Knocking

Don't Come Knocking is a 2005 American Western film directed by German director Wim Wenders and written by Wenders and actor/playwright Sam Shepard. The two had previously collaborated on the film Paris, Texas (1984). It was entered into the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. Plot Shepard stars as Howard Spence, an aging, hard-living Western movie star, who, disgusted with his life & washed up, flees by horse from the set of his latest western filming in the desert outside Moab, Utah. He hits the road looking for refuge in his past, traveling to his hometown of Elko, Nevada to visit his mother, who he hasn't seen in 30 years. And, eventually, to Butte, Montana, looking for a woman (Jessica Lange) he left behind twenty years before when he was filming a movie there. Also converging on Butte is a young woman named Sky (Sarah Polley), returning her late mother's ashes to her hometown and conducting a search of her own. Spence is doggedly pursued by Mr. Sutter (Tim Roth), a humorless representative of the company insuring Spence's latest film, whose mission is to return Spence to the set to finish filming the movie. Cast Sam Shepard as Howard Spence Jessica Lange as Doreen Tim Roth as Sutter Gabriel Mann as Earl Sarah Polley as Sky Fairuza Balk as Amber Eva Marie Saint as Howard's Mother James Gammon as Old Ranch Hand Marley Shelton as the starlet Kurt Fuller as Mr. Daily Actors and cameos The film features cameo appearances by George Kennedy as a beleaguered movie director, and Tim Matheson and Julia Sweeney as movie producers. Also appearing briefly is Tom Farrell (from Wenders 1980 Lightning Over Water and the Screaming Man from Paris, Texas) as a high-school acquaintance who recognizes Howard along the way. The film also marks the first collaboration in 18 years (since 1988's Far North) between Shepard and his longtime partner Jessica Lange, as the two had an agreement never to work at the same time, in order not to neglect their children. Lange, Saint, Polley and Kennedy are all winners of Academy Awards.