And, indeed, I will ask on my own account here, an idle question: which is better—cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?---Fyodor Dostoevsky ---Notes from Underground There are certain people of whom it is difficult to say anything which will at once throw them into relief—in other words, describe them graphically in their typical characteristics. These are they who are generally known as “commonplace people,” and this class comprises, of course, the immense majority of mankind. Authors, as a rule, attempt to select and portray types rarely met with in their entirety, but these types are nevertheless more real than real life itself. For instance, when the whole essence of an ordinary person’s nature lies in his perpetual and unchangeable commonplaceness; and when in spite of all his endeavours to do something out of the common, this person ends, eventually, by remaining in his unbroken line of routine—. I think such an individual really does become a type of hi
Funny Games (1997)
"The movie gives you what you think you want, and then gives you some more, and just when you think things can't get any worse, Haneke swoops in and smashes the wall between fiction and reality, turning the viewer into a direct accomplice to what's transpiring onscreen. It is an astonishing film, sure to be controversial, and quite simply unforgettable"
Funny Games plot is profoundly simple. A middle-aged upper-middle-class Austrian family, mum (Anna,Susanne Lothar), dad (Georg, Ulrich Muhe) and their son begin vacation at a lakeside summerhouse. There they encounter two young man, Peter (Frank Giering) and Paul (Arno Frisch). At first they seem polite and innocent enough, but upon being invited inside gradually proceed to terrorize the family, initially imposing themselves beyond comfortable social custom before eventually assaulting, taking hostage and playing sadistic games on them.The escalation of events is horrifying .
Funny Games is far from being a straightforward exercise in genre filmmaking, as is made clear by its notorious "fourth wall breaking". The first instance of this occurs when Paul, subtly and in extreme close-up, winks sinisterly at the camera. Later on the two villains totally obliterate the boundary between on-screen character and audience, as Paul and Peter directly address the viewer, asking us what we think is going to happen.Then towards the end of the film, when Ann gets hold of the shotgun and shoots Peter, Paul uses remote control can to rewind the scene .
"Anyone who leaves the cinema doesn't need the film, and anyone who stays does!' Said Michael Haneke when it was suggested that the most 'morally appropriate" response to his excruciating German-language film Funny Games was to walk out.
- Release date: March 11, 1998 (USA)Languages: German, French, Italian
- Release date: March 11, 1998 (USA)Languages: German, French, Italian
