Funny Games preview

[bironic]

A trailer for Michael Haneke's new movie, Funny Games, came on TV last night, and I found it very upsetting -- so much so that I had kind of a nightmare about it. A remake of Haneke's 1997 Austrian movie of the same title, now in English and starring Naomi Watts and Tim Roth, it's about a pair of sociopathic young men who torture a family (mother, father, young son, dog) in their vacation home over a weekend. Set ironically to Peer Gynt, the preview shows the family sitting on their couch, hurt and terrified, submitting to their creepy, smart, smug captors' games (and, eventually, it appears, manipulating them in turn). It is not sexy. Correction: parts of it are sexy -- there are clips of Naomi Watts with her shirt hanging off her shoulders, etc. -- but the stripping of the family's clothes is not sexy, the hostage situation is not sexy, the way they've done up Tim Roth to look sweaty-ashen and desperate is not sexy. This is a slow, deliberate, horrific kind of violence -- about humiliation, anguish and helplessness as much as physical pain -- far different from what dominated Apocalypto, stylized and exotic and fast. The people and situations in Funny Games are much closer to my experience and therefore much harder to distance myself from.

All of which seems to be Haneke's point; from some reading this morning I've learned that his films often include "meta" explorations of how the media portrays violence and how we've been desensitized to it. And then, this quote about Funny Games appeared on the Museum of Television & Radio website during a retrospective of his work last year:

Haneke's most explicitly assaultive film [...] is an investigation of the razor-thin line between obscenity and pornography. "Insofar as truth is always obscene, I hope that all of my films have at least an element of obscenity.... Pornography, it seems to me, is no different from war films or propaganda films in that it tries to make the visceral, horrific, or transgressive elements of life consumable" (Haneke).

Is he criticizing the media for trying to make violence and sex consumable instead of shocking and disturbing? Is he attempting to reawaken our horror about what we've been numbed to? Because if he is, it's certainly working; the trailer alone has haunted me for hours and hours. "Truth is always obscene" -- is he pointing out that telling the truth necessitates horror, and that it ought to upset us? Is he, like so many other horror film makers, drawing attention to the fact that any ordinary person is subject to unspeakable violence at any moment though we prefer to pretend otherwise? Is he doing all of this and turning it on its head at the same time, making a classic horror film and deconstructing and contorting it all at once? (The music, title and lettering all suggest a twisted sense of humor about the whole thing.)

And yet I can't decide whether it would be a good idea to go see the film. If it's as affecting as its ad, it will be incredibly difficult to sit through -- more so even than those similar scenes in A Clockwork Orange. But that's Haneke's goal, isn't it? Is that a good reason to go? Is there an obligation to go, to confront one's own fears of such violence? (This does not seem to be the sort of senseless horror you'd get in a typical horror movie, but something far more profound.) Has anyone seen the original, or Caché, or any of his other films and could speculate on how this might go?

Comments

[hannahrorlove.livejournal.com]

I don't think this will be like A Clockwork Orange, because its violent scenes are designed to excite the viewer by allowing them to experience Alex's joy in the acts. It doesn't seem like that will happen in Funny Games.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Yes, they seem like very different movies with very different purposes. I debated whether to put the comparison in there at the end, even though I was only meaning to point out the similarity of the Funny Games premise with those particular scenes in A Clockwork Orange where the thugs break into the husband and wife's home and humiliate them in front of each other.

[hannahrorlove.livejournal.com]

Yeah, good point - I can't think of another movie involving breaking-and-entering and humiliation. Well, for a given value of "humiliation."

It's probably because I saw it recently, but now I'm wondering how Funny Games will be compared to A History of Violence.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

Hm. I haven't seen A History of Violence (wife finds out about husband's violent past-that-is-not-quite-past?), but I have heard good things about it.

[hannahrorlove.livejournal.com]

Yes. I enjoyed it for the lack of flashiness - all the violence obeyed real-world rules of physics and anatomy, which made it all the more gruesome. It's a good character examination.

[elynittria.livejournal.com]

I would feel pretty conflicted about watching a movie such as you describe. Yes, it's a good thing that the director/writer is pointing out how desensitized viewers have become to violence, but I find the idea of making money from doing almost the same thing very problematic.

I have seen Caché and did not enjoy it. IMHO, it did not at all live up to the glowing reviews I had read about it. The graphic violence was ultimately pointless and seemingly inserted for shock value alone. I much preferred A History of Violence.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

I should bump A History of Violence up on my list of movies to rent. And maybe I should finally try Caché to test the Haneke waters. I wanted to see it when it came out, but I never got around to it.

I find the idea of making money from doing almost the same thing very problematic.

Hm. Yes. I'm caught -- I don't want to pass too much judgment on the movie without having seen it (or read any reviews), but at the same time I'm trying to figure out if I want to see it at all...

[jdr1184.livejournal.com]

This is the kind of movie I can only watch at home, where I can periodically hide under a blanket or hit the mute button. I actually like Tim Roth quite a bit so I'll probaly give it a go.

[bironic.livejournal.com]

That's a plan to consider. :) I like Tim Roth too, but not enough in this case.

If I had Garak and/or Bashir there to hold me when things got disturbing, I'd probably try it. *g*