AGNÈS GODARD ON ROOM 666

This is an interview I made with the César Award winner cinematographer Agnès Godard in 2016, in her house in Paris. It was supposed to be published in Klok Magazine No.9, but never did since we stopped publishing the magazine soon after this interview.
The actual interview is around two hours long, but this short film focuses on Agnès Godard’s take on Wim Wender’s Room 666, especially around the reasons behind the absence of the controversial filmmaker Yılmaz Güney in the film.

As the cinematographer of the film, made in 1982 by Wim Wenders in a hotel room, inviting 15 directors to answer the same question about the death of cinema, she talks about her memories and experience of the shoot, and how Güney appeared in the film with only his voice.

EXCERPT FROM THE INTERVIEW

A : I don’t know if you know how this film was shot but I’ll tell you. Obviously it was really impressive to see all those directors in the same room. But the organization was unique. The camera was placed on a tripod, it was a camera that was able to shoot only for 10 minutes. The directors were invited into the room one by one and were asked to sit to the sofa, just like the sofa I’m sitting right now. Besides the director who would talk, there were only me and the sound engineer in the room. We were pressing the record button and then hiding in the bathroom. The director was the only person in the room with the camera and he had to talk to the camera for 10 minutes. And when he finished, some directors talked for 10 minutes, some for 5 and some for 2, they had to stop the record themselves. So we were all waiting, and weren’t seeing anything. The director was alone in front of the camera answering the question that Wim asked. Sometimes Wim was there asking the question, sometimes it was me or the sound engineer. The question was : « Is cinema a language about to get lost, an art about to die ? ».

So, each director you saw in the film was there, except Yılmaz Güney. Yılmaz Güney was actually there (Cannes) to present his film, but you certainly know better than me what happened. He was a refugee in France and he had to hide. Even I didn’t know where he was. But Wim knew… He went to see him and asked for a permission to photograph him. He printed the photo and brought it to the room where we shot all the other directors. Then he put the photo on the television and it stood there by itself, because of the static electric of the screen. The whole thing was particular for me for two reasons: firstly it was really touching to know that he had to hide etc. But what was even more interesting was that the previous year, he had made a film, a film that you’d know « The Wall », in 60 km north of Paris. And I went there too. Because I had a friend who was making a film of the film. It’s a documentary entitled « Autour du Mur » (Around the Wall) And I went there, but I didn’t have the chance to enter the place where he was filming because Yılmaz Güney didn’t want anyone inside but the crew. But I saw at least where he was filming « The Wall ». So I knew about the film thanks to my friend who was making the documentary and she told us a lot about Yılmaz Güney. It was remarkable. And at that time we were at the Cannes Film Festival to shoot Room 666 and I believe I knew Yılmaz Güney had already a health problem.

Agnès Godard on Room 666

Directed by Can Köroglu
Sound by Ceren Çetinoglu