In 1997, the Austrian provocateur Michael Haneke made “Funny Games”, one of the most frightening and conflicting films of his decade. “Funny Games” follows the fate of a placid family of the upper class of three people (Susanne Lothar, Ulrich Mühe, Stefan Clapczynski) while they go to their cabin by the lake for a miniature holiday. As they settle down, they receive a visit from two frightening young men in tennis whites and gloves, asking to borrow eggs. The young men are Paul (Arno First) and Peter (Frank Giering), and they clearly have a dark program.
As soon as Matriarch Anna asks them to leave, Peter and Paul snatch a golf club and begin to inflict injuries. They reveal that they have already killed the family dog and that other family members are not allowed to leave. Peter and Paul attach them and announce that they will play games. These funny games involve torture, mockery and death. At one point, Paul turns to the camera and asks the public if the Schber family has a chance of survival. It will not be the last time that “Funny Games” breaks the fourth wall.
Without revealing what is going on, “Funny Games” does not end well. Haneke, however, does not only make an invasion thriller at ordinary home. He tortures the public, rather deliberately. Haneke underlines viewers, while they are watching the film, they are responsible for the pain they are witnessing. Looking at the horrors, you suck in blood. Do you want to see the torturers get their violent co-pumping instead? Isn’t that just more thirst for public, asks Haneke? It involves you. He comments on the use of violence in cinema.
And his thesis became clearer in 2007, when Haneke made a remake in a shooting of “Funny Games” in English with recognizable English -speaking stars. Naomi Watts played the mother, Tim Roth the father, and the torturers were played by Michael Pitt and the future director of “The Brutalist” Brady Corbet.
The two functions of funny games are excellent
In the original, he launches the public, building what – at least at the start – an ordinary horror film. Such horror films generally imply that the innocent people are injured, and the public knows it. Haneke has his killers to watch the public directly, declaring that it is them, and not the victims, who we are supposed to identify. Did you come to see the torture? It’s here. You, dear spectator, are the sick. You are the bad. You kill this family.
We left with this involvement, let’s start looking for simple and explainable reasons for which the central family is so seriously punished. Is it because they are rich and candle? This makes sense, because their killers are dressed in tennis outfits, a uniform of the bourgeoisie. Paul and Peter are initially polite, but also strangely critical of the Schber family. They break the eggs they borrow “by accident”, then ask more. Do they test the limits of the politeness of the Schber family? Are the schobers tortured so as not to have to alter this small polite test correctly?
And, wait, aren’t we sick just asking these questions? Surely, then, the thesis of “Funny Games” is to carry out Catharsis by attending torturers confronted with justice, right? If the family can escape, obtain the decline in their kidnappers and reach blood revenge, we, the public, can be assured that justice is rendered. Sometimes we can say comfortably, violence is necessary to balance the scales.
But then, Haneke does not leave us either. The killers can break the fourth wall, so they have total control over the film itself. Even the desire for their death reveals our own need for violence. There is no way to go out for us. We, viewers. We are the culprit.
The American version of Funny Games is more sharp
By redoing “funny games” in English, Haneke has narrowed the theme of his first film to a smaller degree. In the original of 1997, the director comments on the violence of the function in cinema. For him, everything is hard, and we, as members of the public, rarely recognize the security that the cinema screen offers us. When the violence is false, we can move away from it, close large parts of our empathy. Human beings can compartmentalize anything.
But in 2007, there was an additional layer of comments. Haneke is now making a film in English for an American audience. He throws recognizable stars like his victims of torture and released his film in a greater number of theaters than his original has never seen. The 2007 film was a relatively general public release. The commentary therefore applies more specifically to violence in American -public American films. Haneke does not only imply a film of cinema in violence on the screen, but in particular the Americans.
In 2007, remember, torture films were very fashionable. 2007 was the same year as “Saw IV”, for example. The Americans treated their trauma on September 11 – not to mention the photos of real prison torture out of Abu Ghraib – looking to torture on the screen. We have withdrawn the curse of real violence by engaging in the fictitious variety. It was a dark form of therapy. Michael Haneke, born in Austria, was not going to allow Americans to use his film to serve violent ideas. He was going to push him on our faces. Do you want violence? You will get it. And if it’s disturbing or horrible, well, it’s a bit for you, isn’t it?
The two versions of “Funny Games” are excellent because they are largely identical.
