Clément Cogitore

In 1982, Wim Wenders asked 16 of his fellow directors to speak on the future of cinema, resulting in the film Room 666. Now, 40 years later, in Cannes, director Lubna Playoust asks Wim Wenders himself and a new generation of filmmakers (James Gray, Rebecca Zlotowski, Claire Denis, Olivier Assayas, Nadav Lapid, Asghar Farhadi, Alice Rohrwacher and more) the same question: “is cinema a language about to get lost, an art about to die?”

Stéphane Lissner, director of the Paris Opera, entrusts the staging of the opera-ballet Les Indes galantes to the visual artist Clément Cogitore. Based on the experience of his short film Les Indes galantes, the artist updates Jean-Philippe Rameau's baroque masterpiece (1735) by bringing together lyric song and urban dance. The choreography is entrusted to Bintou Dembélé who supervises dancers from krump, popping, voguing or even experimental hip hop. From rehearsals to the Premiere, Philippe Béziat films the meeting of urban dancers with the lyric institution and invites the spectator to share a human and artistic experience.

Virgile and Blanche, both aged 17, correspond by e-mail. Virgile loves Blanche, but Blanche loves a boy named Eustache. Nobody knows the other's thoughts. Virgile talks about life and death and Blanche listens acceptingly. Eustache enters the room in a blue cap. He sees Virgile first, then Blanche. Then Blanche remembers having danced with Virgile and leves the room to join him.

The story is one of an architect that has lost his inspiration and goes looking for those motivations that pushed him as a youngster to take up the profession. Inspiring him was the baroque movement and all of its artifices: the Guarini in Turin and the Borromini in Rome. The film’s central story ends up being the love story that develops between architecture, artistic inspiration and feelings.

Previously focused on Asian directors, “Jeonju Digital Project 2007” takes a look at Europe. The Portuguese filmmaker Pedro Costa, the German filmmaker Harun Farocki, and the French filmmaker Eugène Green participated in this project.

As long as there is cinema, LE CERCLE will be there. It is the only television program of critical debates 100% devoted to cinema. Each week, it offers fiery, joyful and non-condescending jousts on the films on the bill; and invites with "Le questionnaire du CERCLE" directors to come and share their passion for cinema.