Funny Games (1997)
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Funny Games Movie Review
Funny Games is a 1997 Austrian psychological thriller film directed by Michael Haneke and starring Susanne Lothar. It’s such an uncomfortable, highly authentic movie.
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“Why are you doing this to us?
Why not?“
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The film follows two young sadistic men who take a family hostage and torture them psychologically and promising to kill all three of them. It’s a strong premise for a thriller, the one used to its fullest degree. I found it riveting throughout for various reasons, mostly through the feel of discomfort.
Funny Games is a much different thriller film than your usual genre flick. For one, it serves as a strong home invasion horror film in a way and the scene where the boy is chased by the villain chilled me to the bone how scary it was. That one scene is scarier than most real horror movies and coming from a thriller film, it truly is to be respected.
But the biggest factor to its originality is its overall intriguing execution. The film toys with the expectations of the audience by continually making red herrings and promising us the characters’ successful escape which never comes unfortunately. It also winks at us by the use of breaking the fourth wall and it also features a supernatural scene with the remote that’s really unforgettable.
Although such scenes are truly memorable and authentic, they nonetheless take away from the realism of the film which definitely bothered me. But the approach to violence is its most commendable aspect. The film never, ever portrays violence on screen and thus the death scenes feel even more pointless and horrifying.
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By moving away from depicting violence itself, the film focused on the actual horror of expectation of horrible outcome instead of the outcome itself. The suspense is truly palpable throughout the majority of the runtime and it’s admirable how the director managed to make us feel disturbed and uncomfortable just in psychological terms.
The interactions between Paul and Peter, the villains, are superb and very interesting. Paul in particular is horrifying as he feels so real. As for the family, it’s interesting how they deconstructed the traditional family by making the mother and even the child more capable and braver than the father/husband. Susanne Lothar is the acting standout here undoubtedly as she gave a powerhouse performance in what was such a demanding role and a horrible experience for her.
Funny Games is very much a pointless movie. It serves as a great deconstruction of the entire thriller/horror genre, but it doesn’t really offer us anything to think about. The point is basically that there is no point to life as you can die from the hands of a psychopath any moment making the film a highly nihilist subject.
But I do not personally believe in such viewpoints so that bothered me. And the insistence on the director’s part that he made a film about the dangers and bad influences of media on violence is troublesome. It’s a great subject matter to tackle, but he never really tackled it, not even in a subtle way, so he entirely failed at making that point in my opinion.
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It’s a very well directed movie otherwise and certainly one of Michael Haneke’s most inspired efforts. It’s also stupendously edited and paced with never a dull or rushed moment. It’s also bravely and authentically shot in regards to the aforementioned violence. The highlights include that horror scene in the house, the ending and most especially the eggs beginning which is ridiculously uncomfortable to watch and difficult to describe how painful it is.
Although definitely pointless in terms of the message/themes and it makes for one extremely uncomfortable viewing, Funny Games is still very commendable for psychologically tormenting the audience without ever showing the violence itself on screen. It truly is a horrifying thriller that is much scarier than most pure horror movies out there and even though it’s painful to watch, the film is nonetheless riveting, palpably suspenseful and admirably authentic in execution throughout.
