City of Angels

City of Angels is an English language film directed by Brad Silberling in 1998. The film stars Nicolas Cage and Meg Ryan. Set in Los Angeles, California, the film is a remake of Wim Wenders' 1987 German film Wings of Desire, which was set in Berlin.

Seth is an angel that appears only to those who are about to die, or are in the process of death. [He is however, visible to other angels and has conversations with them, and spends his time with one in particular, making it obvious that angels, like humans, think, speak and have opinions.] Seth, and apparently angels in general, always ask the humans what their favorite part of life was. (In the beginning of the film, a young girl looks at Seth and answers, "Pajamas.") Seth watches a heart surgeon (Maggie Rice) try vigorously to save a man's life, although the man is already dead. (He is in fact standing with Seth watching Maggie try to save him.) Seth soon becomes enthralled with Maggie, and finds that he is able to make himself visible to her. Soon their relationship turns from a mild curiosity in each other into a friendship into a quasi-love type of relationship, neither being especially forthcoming.

Later in the film, Seth meets a man in a hospital room who can remarkably tell when angels are present, much to the amazement of Seth. The man, now calling himself Nathaniel Messenger (as angels are God's messengers) eventually tells Seth that he was in fact an angel, just like Seth, but decided to become human. Seth is amazed and begins to think about undergoing this transformation himself so that he can be with Maggie (who cannot be with him because he is an angel and who is eventually asked to marry a co-worker who she has been in a mildly serious relationship with for some time). However, once Seth makes this transformation (in which he falls to Earth, which might not have anything to do with the transformation, but is symbolic nonetheless), he finds Maggie has traveled to a mountain cabin to "get away".