The title identifies the room number of the Hotel Martinez in Cannes, in which Wim Wenders entertained a gaggle of his fellow filmmakers one at a time, sat them down in front of a camera and with their backs to a soundless television (the enemy), and confronted them with the question: "The cinema, is it a language about to get lost, an art about to die?" Godard is not surprisingly the most talkative. Antonioni, also not surprisingly, professes to be unafraid of the new technologies. Paul Morrissey, perhaps more surprisingly, relates the death of the cinema to the death of the novel and the disappearance (from both) of characters. Filipino filmmaker Mike De Leon finds the question absurd: "To ask what the future of cinemas is in the Philippines is like asking what the future of the Philippines is." Werner Herzog takes off his shoes and turns off the television. Steven Spielberg ("I'm one of the last of the optimists") speaks of money, inflation, and budgets. (He also attempts a baseball metaphor and, with characteristic grasp of reality, produces the impression that the World Series goes to nine games.) More illuminating of the artists than of their art, but what would you expect? With R.W. Fassbinder, Monte Hellman, Susan Seidelman, others. (1984) — Duncan Shepherd
This movie is not currently in theaters.