`ANGELS' PITCH; PERSISTENCE GETS SILBERLING JOB DIRECTING CAGE, RYAN.

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Writer

When she was looking for directors for what turned out to be her final movie, the late producer Dawn Steel was sure of one thing: the romantic fantasy ``City of Angels'' would not be made by the guy who did ``Casper.''

``Angels'' was, after all, based on Wim Wenders' German masterpiece ``Wings of Desire,'' one of the most intelligent and admired art films of the 1980s. Though the American version would be different, less intellectual and more of a love story between an immortal observer and a down-to-earth doctor, it still needed a serious, poetic sensibility at the helm.

Brad Silberling's only other big-screen effort may have been a breakthrough in the field of visual effects, but it was also a screechy, slapstick children's entertainment with all the lyricism of a visit to Chuck E. Cheese.

Still, the boyish-looking director, who also has episodes of ``L.A. Law'' and ``NYPD Blue'' to his credit, knew he was the man for ``City of Angels.'' Even during his first meeting with the staunchly unconvincible producer.

``At the beginning of the meeting, Dawn told Brad, `I don't care how much you sway me, how much you move me, there's no way you're going to direct this movie,' '' says Charles Roven, Steel's widower and producing partner.

``Dawn was great,'' adds Silberling. ``She was so honest. She listed all of these other directors that she'd rather have make the movie - Sydney Pollack, Peter Weir - she listed them all, and it was plenty. I said, `That's fine. I'm gonna do the movie. So when you're done with your phone sheet, let me know.' ''

``After the meeting, she said, `I think I just met the director of this film,' '' Roven reveals.

From angel to mortal

What Silberling saw in Dana Stevens' screenplay was not just the standard celebration of life, but of the sometimes alarming urge to participate in it. When Nicolas Cage, as the guardian angel Seth, gives up his immortality after falling in love with Meg Ryan's troubled L.A. heart surgeon Maggie Rice, he is essentially trading an existence of observing for a life of feeling.

``In essence, all of the angels are there to celebrate and, almost, envy our existence,'' the director says. ``But they don't know the full extent of the joy because they don't participate. The film is about daring to leap into the unknown and love.''

In his chameleonlike career, Cage has made numerous swan dives into unexplored territory: David Lynch surrealism in ``Wild at Heart,'' eating live insects in ``Vampire's Kiss,'' suicidal alcoholism in his Oscar-winning ``Leaving Las Vegas'' performance. Lately, Cage has gone the action-hero route in three back-to-back blockbusters, ``The Rock,'' ``Con Air'' and ``Face/Off.''

Playing Seth not only offered him a break from the cinematic carnage, but a chance to make another creative stretch.

``It was important, to me, to get back to a more personal point of view with the acting,'' Cage says. ``However, the challenge with Seth was, how could I express the delight I felt when I was 6 years old and I discovered sparkles in the sidewalk. How could I convey that without seeming silly and goofy? How could I show the excitement of being re-excited by the simple things in life, like sunlight on my face or the wind? Seth was all about that. He didn't take anything for granted, he was not jaded or cynical.''

Cage's perspective

With his background in the independent film scene, Cage was naturally quite familiar with ``Wings of Desire.'' He appreciated the differences between the two films, though.

`` `Wings of Desire' was primarily about what was going on in the minds of people after the war in Berlin,'' Cage says. ``There were some love story aspects to it, but `City of Angels' is really about the love story. Our film also asks more questions about the nature of what it means to pass away and be alive, and the real value of life.''

``Dawn made it very clear, even when we were negotiating for the rights back in 1988, that she loved the Wenders film so much that she didn't really want to remake it,'' Roven adds. ``She wanted to explore a different avenue, take the conceit that one of the angels who were observing life might fall in love with a mortal and actually play out what would happen if that love affair could unfold and flourish.''

Having been in development for a decade, ``City'' can't honestly be accused of jumping on the pop culture bandwagon that has driven angel everything in recent years, from numerous books to films like ``Michael'' to the ``Touched by an Angel'' TV series.

But it will be anyway.

``Y'know, it's all so precious,'' says Andre Braugher, who trades in the persona of a tough TV cop, ``Homicide's'' Frank Pembleton, for the blissful countenance of Cassiel, Seth's best angel buddy. ``There are so many angel books available, and they don't hold together after a while. I found the vision that Wim Wenders created in `Wings of Desire' to be compelling enough for me to follow.''

L.A. story

Physically, the new film's biggest change from the mostly black-and-white ``Wings'' is its romanticized, often elevated view of the City of Angels itself.

``The whole world is familiar with what they think are icons of Los Angeles,'' says director Silberling. ``To get the audience looking at things from a different perspective, as Meg's character is forced to do in the film, the goal was to photograph sometimes familiar spots in the city from different perspectives.

``And the overhead view, whether it's Seth's or another's, connects parts of the town which otherwise, to us who live here, seem quite disparate. You can get very locked up in your own small world in Los Angeles; you're in your car all day long, it's not a city that tends to promote community. I thought this was an interesting, visual way to tie the city together.''

And make it look magical.

``It's time that we see L.A. as a romantic city,'' adds Cage, a Southern California native who owns, among other local properties, a castle in the Hollywood Hills. ``I've had romantic things happen to me here, and I have a certain personal pride about Los Angeles. To me, the movie is like a postcard to the city. It's interesting; a lot of the spots that we filmed in, I live very close to.''

In the end, ``City of Angels'' seems a fitting tribute to both its setting and its inspiration (Wenders himself recently told The New York Times that he feels the remake is ``... done with respect, with a sense of discovery all its own'').

And, of course, it's a tribute to Steel, a pioneering executive who was the first woman to run a major studio and who succumbed to a brain tumor at the end of last year.

``We had many projects in the development pipeline, but this was the one that was closest to Dawn's heart,'' Roven says.

Cage, who isn't sure whether or not angels really exist, has faith in one thing.

``I think a movie like this has the power to affect people's thoughts and conversation, make us ponder the deeper meanings of existence,'' he says. ``And I hope it might give some comfort.''

CAPTION(S):

3 Photos

Photo: (1--Cover--Color) Desire in L.A.

`City of Angels' wings it (Meg Ryan and Nicolas Cage)

(2) In ``City of Angels,'' Nicolas Cage plays a guardian angel who gives up immortality for life - and love - in Los Angeles.

(3) Meg Ryan is a troubled surgeon in ``City of Angels,'' which was inspired by 1988's ``Wings of Desire.''