Chambre 666 Cannes May '82

In Room 666 there's a video camera and a tape recorder. Wenders prevailed upon a bunch of fellow directors attending Cannes '82 to venture into the room alone, switch on the machines and deliberate in front of them on the future, if any, of the cinema and television. (A TV, turned on but silent, is also part of the set-up.) What gets said is, on the whole, less interesting than seeing how the luminaries behave in a room by themselves. Godard and Spielberg illustrate two extremes (but of course!), the former fiddling with various props and communicating cosmic disgruntlement, the latter friendly, precise, comparatively optimistic. Herzog exerts control by taking off his shoes and switching off the TV, Antonioni is the most restless, Filipino director De Leon is admirably brisk. And so on, to moderately engaging effect.