For German director Wim Wenders, Alice in the Cities was the turning point in his career. His previous three films, he felt, were too heavily indebted to the works of other people, including Alfred Hitchcock and Nathaniel Hawthorne.
He could chose to continue this trend, or he could develop a story - and more broadly a voice - of his own. He consciously chose to make a film of his own. That film ended up becoming 1974's Alice in the Cities, which is a road movie that tells the story of German man who travels across the United States and Germany to help return a young girl to her family. The film, which was co-written by Wenders, was wildly successful and accomplished exactly what Wenders wanted it to.
Wenders and his co-writer were inspired by Peter Handke's (Wenders' friend) experiences as a single parent and his novel Short Letter, Long Farewell. Wenders also drew from John Ford's film Young Mr. Lincoln, which is featured in the film.
Finally, the movie was filmed. Because of budgetary constraints, Wenders decided to shoot the movie in black and white 16 mm film (instead of what he originally wanted, 35 mm film). Also, as the shooting for the film progressed, Wenders and the cast and crew progressively ignored the script, choosing to improvise most scenes rather than rigidly follow the script.
