Funny Games has absolutely no redeeming qualities. Some might say that by showing 112 minutes of unrelenting violence and vulgarity, viewers will become repulsed by the amount of violence in mass media and lead a revolution for change. Yeah, right. There always has been and always will be an audience for violent movies and shockingly bad ones. Funny Games fits the bill on both counts. The film has an air of smugness that's hard to ignore. You just know that Heneke believes he's made the ultimate message movie — the kind of in-your-face accusation of the audience's love of things crass and disturbing. To bring this point home, Paul even looks at the audience a few times, just to let us know he understands our voyeuristic urges. Games is an attempt to get us to not only look at the action onscreen, but also our reaction to it. Many viewers will be compelled to vomit or just turn the film off, making more intellectual thoughts impossible.
Funny Games is bound to leave most viewers fairly disgusted. However, the element of abject terror is strangely missing. This is due in no small measure to the performances of Barry Corbet and Michael Pitt. Their clean good looks make you wonder what fashion magazine they stepped out of, and their soft squeaky voices imply no threat at all. So while you know these boys are going to kill this family, an element of terror doesn't exist. Instead, you might find yourself just waiting for the inevitable ending.
In the end, Funny Games is a pointless exercise. Whatever point Heneke hope to make is lost in a sea of bad filmmaking decisions. There are close-ups of unimportant objects, line after line of pointless dialogue, and lots of off camera action. If Heneke's mission was to indict the media for its promotion of violence and vulgarity, Funny Games only succeeds at inflicting torture on its audience.
The DVD includes both the widescreen and standard editions. The audio is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 surround. Subtitles are available in English, French and Spanish.
Funny Games offers no special features.
Article comments
1 - Derek Fleek
Another great review. I also didn't like it for the exact reasons you state. However, I didn't hate the film. Although I thought there were a couple moments of intelect, the majority of it was pointless. It was a good effort, but Michael Haneke doesn't quite grasp the meaning of entertainment.
2 - Mary K. Williams
I just saw this last night. Although I have to grudgingly congratulate the director for not taking the expected route, the whole serious of gratuitous 'see how risky and thought provoking I can be' moments don't serve Haneke well. But of course, he must have done something right to bring me here to share my thoughts, eh?