shakercoola A difficult film for audiences because of the deplorable violence and vanishingly small relief extended to the viewer. The flaw is one of Introspection which is one of many fiction-writing modes and conventions used to convey the thoughts of a character. The film, by portraying such brutality leaves us with merely damned people and evil people. The lack of emotional connection between director and viewer results in redundancy. The viewer does not reach an enhanced position by having understood the deeper motives form the inner dialogue of the characters.

sunheadbowed 'It turns out one universe is real, the other fiction.' 'How come?' 'I don't know.''Funny Games' is an unflinching and fearless study on morality that manages to be both terrifying and funny, it's certainly a film that would be misunderstood by many.The film is a deliberately jarring juxtaposition of both exploitative unrealism and the depressingly realistic within the spectrum of cinema violence. The antagonists are known to us by comical nicknames, such as 'Fatty' or 'Beavis and Butthead' and 'Tom and Jerry' (the latter a deliberate reference to 'acceptable' screen violence for children we take for granted), they constantly make jokes and speak directly to the camera that they perform for, having learned how to behave in this situation from watching violent films, yet we are never allowed to relate to them or their sense of humour, or feel any sympathy for what they are doing, they are completely unjustified at all times; the victims of 'Funny Games' on the other hand are presented horrifically real -- it's likely this is how people would react in the real world when thrown into this nightmare situation, and they are unaware that they are starring in a movie (the late Susanne Lothar's performance in particular is unforgettable). This seesaw of the silly cartoon and the gut-wrenchingly real is uncomfortable to the extreme.This is a film about film violence, it is not a 'violent film'. All acts of violence happen off-screen, we are never permitted to partake in any explicit titillation or enjoyment of witnessing violent acts. The one important exception to this rule is when Anna grabs a shotgun from her captors and blows Fatty's guts out against the wall. We are punished immediately for how much we enjoy this act of revenge by the other antagonist, played by Arno Frisch, grabbing the remote, rewinding the film and resetting us right back to where we were before the act happened. It's an absurdly clever and intellectual moment but it's one that will disgust anyone coming to this film from the wrong angle.Likewise, at one point Anna is forced to strip naked by her captors, which happens off-screen, only a close-up of her face with its etched shock and despair is shown to us and we are not allowed to partake in this act of sexual violence; yet later, when alone with her husband she voluntarily takes off her top displaying her breasts to the viewer. The message is clear: nudity is not immoral, but violence and rape is, even if you're merely a voyeur.There is some powerful symbolic imagery in 'Funny Games', too, such as when Fatty accidentally drops and smashes three eggs -- one for each kidnapped family member, and the sight of the knife on the boat, which is psychologically introduced to us at the beginning of the film as a symbol of hope, only to be flippantly tossed into the water at the close.Ultimately, it's difficult to understand what exact message the film is giving to us: is cinema's exploitation of violence a force for evil in the world? Depictions of violence per se are not dangerous, but how violence is presented, how we view that violence and what we feel about bloody revenge are most certainly dangerous grey areas that we must always talk about. Thankfully there are some filmmakers such as Michael Haneke who are brave and moral enough to confront us with the questions we need to be asked.

hdzenis They did a great job regarding the psychotic scenario they ware aiming at, but believe me when I say, don't watch this movie if you don't have a strong stomach. It's not for everybody. On the other hand, if you truly like weird, wicked, and disturbed kinda movies, I would recommend it. It's a realistic visualization of a psycho home invasion all the way to detail.

Rafael Jaramillo Michael Haneke (MH) is a not so mainstream director (such as Martin Scorsese for example), but he definitely should be. This review will be based 60% in "Funny Games" (FG) and 40% in MH as a director. I find myself very fond of him due to one simple fact: he's a modern-day Stanley Kubrick (SK), which I regard as the best film director/auteur of all time. Dedicated to analyze and explore the dark sides of humanity, he achieves in this film a "funny" portrayal of his point of view about Violence.FG is not for the faint of heart. MH has a distaste of how Hollywood portrays violence in movies, which is an explicit and morbid exploitation, which sometimes reaches unhealthy levels. Talking about violence in the film: the film is violent, but you never get to see violent or bloody images. MH loves to take the attention away from those detailed moments to create expectations and make the audience's imagination start playing "games". The uncertainty of this moments makes the heavy atmosphere of the flick. The greatest example is: when Paul is making himself a sandwich and you hear the gunshot and consequent screams; you feel desperate for knowing what happened. If the movie was made by a USA filmmaker, it is very probably that you could see what happened, in detail.The film walks between fiction and reality. Paul makes various fourth-wall breaks throughout the movie, and he even rewinds the scene where Anna shoots Peter (not allowing that to happen). Peter, on the other hand, refers and critic many aspects of the traditional suspense rules established by USA films. We are accustomed to seeing the protagonist win and live to tell the tale, well, not here. Paul and Peter even have an interesting discussion about fiction and reality at the end of the film, which makes you think about it afterward.Our main villains: charming well-educated sociopaths that will do whatever they please with whoever they want. Taking Paul as the leader, a little perfect Hannibal Lecter (leaving aside Cannibalism and Psychopathy). In the end, they did everything for just one simple aspect: because they could, and no one has ever told them they couldn't do something.Attention is what MH plays within his movies. He demands complete attention from you to understand. Whether it is with Long Shots or never giving explicit detail of what's going on, MH proves to be a skillful manipulator of the audience to achieve this: you leaving the theater wanting more. We are used to finishing a movie totally satisfied with what we saw and how everything ended (happily ever after). Well, not with MH. He wants you to go browsing and find whatever you can about what you just saw. Most than nothing, he wants you to make your OWN conclusions about the story: "Caché" (2005) and "The White Ribbon" (2009) for naming two. MH has between 10 to 15 movies to his name, all of them considered good movies, showing different aspects of humanity (often the dark ones), with a perfect sense of direction and meticulous execution. Tell me if this doesn't remind you of SK: Quality before Quantity. It is also important to state the difference between horror and terror. Horror is for fictional and irrational fears (ghosts and supernatural situations), and terror is for real things (a murderer or an accident). This movie is which? Kind of both isn't it?. On one side, you have a home invasion and in the other an antagonist that can manipulate time and space for achieving success. MH said that the movie was a message about violence in media. He said FG was intended to be neither horror nor terror.Something funny is that MH hates Quentin Tarantino (QT), mostly because he mixes violence and comedy, and his violence is extremely satirical. MH has a violent and bold style for most of his movies. He believes that violence portrayed in movies should have a serious and deep approach, special reason why he despises QT's movies. MH's filming style, psychological approach, and audience manipulation are his greatest weapons. He doesn't fear to make a movie of any theme or genre, and whenever he does, the final product is an instant masterpiece. He made a shot-for-shot remake of FG in 2007 with an entire USA crew. The film received mixed reviews. Why? Because it wasn't the kind of violence and suspense USA audiences like. MH wanted to prove a point, and he succeeded. MY FINAL CONSENSUS: Funny Games is out of the question a different kind of suspense and thriller, but a pretty interesting and effective one. Michael Haneke plays with audiences, in order to bring an excellent law-breaker critic of violence portrayal.