with phenomenal success, and Sam later succeeds with his recordings. Although Edith is at first exhilarated to be able to "see" again, the ugly, pixellated images she receives contribute to her growing despondency. On New Year's Eve, the same evening the group have intercepted a mundane radio broadcast that indicates human civilization has not ended, she "just let[s] go" and passes away quietly. After Edith's burial, Winter, Chico, and Burt leave the compound to go home. Henry, hoping to win a Nobel Prize, begins working on how to use his technology to record human dreams, but the Aborigines who have been assisting him disagree with this and abandon him. He continues by experimenting on himself, Sam, and Claire, who eventually become addicted to viewing their dreams on portable video screens. Eugene finds a catatonic Claire and takes her away from the lab, driving her into painful withdrawal when he refuses to replace the batteries for her screen. He finishes his novel, in which he writes her as being healthy and happy, and gives it to her, using the "truth of the words" to cure her of the "disease of images". Meanwhile, Sam wanders away from the lab and is ultimately cured by David and an Aboriginal ritual, and Henry is taken by the CIA while lying in the lab's dream-recording chair. Eugene and Claire break up for good, but remain friends. Henry later dies in 2001, with Sam visiting his grave. While in San Francisco, Sam sees his wife (who has since remarried) and son from a distance, realizing that he has lost them forever. On Claire's 30th birthday, Eugene's book comes out and he, Winter, and the French bank robbers call Claire, who is in the middle of a six-month stint as an ecological observer on a space station, to sing her "Happy Birthday". Cast Solveig Dommartin as Claire Tourneur Chick Ortega as Chico Rémy Eddy Mitchell as Raymond Monnet William Hurt as Sam Farber, alias Trevor McPhee Adelle Lutz as Makiko Ernie Dingo as Burt Sam Neill as Eugene Fitzpatrick Rüdiger Vogler as Philip Winter Elena Smirnova as Krasikova Kuniko Miyake as Mrs. Mori Chishū Ryū as Mr. Mori Allen Garfield as Used-Car Dealer Lois Chiles as Elsa Farber David Gulpilil as David Jeanne Moreau as Edith Farber Jimmy Little as Peter Max von Sydow as Henry Farber Production Wenders began working on the film as early as