Recommend me some Michael Haneke

I tolerated it.

i pretty much hated the original funny games. might be the first time i have strongly felt much much smarter than a filmmaker.

funny games was the first film that made you feel smarter than the filmmaker? are you out of your mind? do you not live in america?

dyou mean he was personally involved in terrorizing german tourists or sending videos to people?

-- That one guy that hit it and quit it, Monday, September 17, 2007 8:57 PM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark Link

You didn't see Benny's Video, did you.

-- Nubbelverbrennung, Tuesday, September 18, 2007 7:30 AM (1 week ago) Bookmark Link

no, must i?

i was responding to "he's a hypocrite coward going back through his films and removing any autobiographical clues that might implicate his own love for violence" -- was he personally involved in terrorizing german tourists or sending videos to people then?

I like the idea of a shot-for-shot remake (and even the trailer is nearly identical between the 1997 and 2008 versions) by the same director as an overt "fuck your ignorance of subtitled cinema" to American audiences. And if it makes back its money and inspires people to go back to the original (and see how unnecessary the remake was), so much the better, no?

"inspires"

Manohla Dargis had this balanced blurb in Sunday's Times (tho I think Le Pianiste is even worse than Funny Games):

At once admired and fiercely loathed, the German-born provocateur MICHAEL HANEKE polarizes critics far more than does any filmmaker of comparable stature working today. His bad rap is understandable, but it's also misleading and, given the recent on-screen evidence, out of date, out of touch and seriously out of bounds.

Born in 1942, Mr. Haneke started in television before making the move into film with his first theatrical release, "The Seventh Continent" (1989), about a middle-class family's cataclysmic meltdown. The first installment in what he calls his "glaciation trilogy" — the other two features are "Benny's Video," from 1992, and "71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance," from 1994 — "The Seventh Continent" involves a number of Mr. Haneke's preoccupations, including what might be termed the pathology of bourgeois life.

Nobody sticks it to the middle class with such unforgiving ferocity (at least these days), which helps explain why he rouses critics to passionate extremes; they tend to reject his criticisms outright or embrace them as confirmations of their own (superior) worldview. There's something absurd about Mr. Haneke's condescending attitude toward the audience in some of his work, as if the art-house faithful, his core constituency, needed a lecture on the banality of evil. His overreliance on shocking violence to score his didactic hits has been particularly problematic — see the impeccably directed, intellectually bankrupt "Funny Games" (1997) — not only because it blunts the work's power, but also because it makes Mr. Haneke seem more like a sadist than a voice of troubled conscience.

His recent French-language films — including "The Piano Teacher," from 2001, and "Caché," from 2005 — are more honest and human, and often brilliant. They shatter, rather than punish. "Michael Haneke" runs from Wednesday through Friday at the Museum of Modern Art Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 1, (212) 708-9400.

It was clear from your overly literal understanding of what I meant by "autobiographical elements" that you hadn't seen "Benny's Video". I mean that dude left his own language and country behind in his films because in his early films, fucked-up violence-obsessed Austrian youth are always sticking it to the bourgeoisie -- an accusation that can and has been easily made against him (dig for instance the Dargis article immediately above this).

Haneke was only "German-born" in the most literal sense (only coincidentally born there because it was the nearest hospital to were the family lived in Salzburger Land) -- he grew up about a half hour away from my cabin in the Vienna Woods. I kinda know his type.

And Dargis is way wrong on one thing: to the extent that his non-German language films appear more human, I suspect that they are less honest.

once again Nubbelverbrennung, no i haven't seen 'benny's video'.

too shaming, i know.

you implied that haneke had violent past. what you meant was he was fascinated by violence.

Haneke was only "German-born" in the most literal sense (only coincidentally born there because it was the nearest hospital to were the family lived in Salzburger Land) -- he grew up about a half hour away from my cabin in the Vienna Woods. I kinda know his type.

he was born in 1942...

Never confuse your own inference with some else's implication, dude.

"he was born in 1942..."

You don't know any Austrians, do you.

So I guess you aren't going to any of these at MOMA, are you, Morbius?

It's possible if any of the baseball series end early, since I get in free w/member card. (Funny Games is the only pre-Code Unknown one I've seen.)

As much as I hate Haneke's stuff, I actually think most of his early movies are worth watching once.

I thought Caché was brilliant.

I might try this 2-part 4-hour TV epic Lemmings on Saturday, as '79 sounds like long enough ago that he was probably free of the recent bad habits.

http://moma.org/calendar/films.php?id=6249&ref=calendar

i know this is prob a long shot, but has anyone seen the german film "this very moment"

Funny Games is good but I'd steer clear of the American shot for shot remake by Haneke himself..Time Of The Wolf is mind blowing and terrifying..definetly don't watch late at night

Cannes goes bananas. "Tender" (???) but "grueling."

http://www.fandor.com/blog/cannes-2012-michael-haneke%e2%80%99s-amour/

https://twitter.com/Michael_Haneke

Michael Haneke ‏@Michael_Haneke
playin ‘who has the most parms dorz’ with terruns malick gets so borin. im sick of winnin evrytime lol #teamhaneke

Michael Haneke ‏@Michael_Haneke
jst hurd that amour got no nominayshuns in the #sagawards but marigold hotel did!!1! mor like #saggyawards lol

Michael Haneke ‏@Michael_Haneke
aparentlee i jst wons an Las Angelies critix award for best picture!!1!! @brettratner can u pick it up 4 me wen ur out of hooters lol

Michael Haneke ‏@Michael_Haneke
wot did evry1 think of the new terruns malick film? o thats rite, it still doesnt hav a releese date. wondr wot that means lol #teamhaneke

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I saw his four hour tv-miniseries Lemminge from 1979 today. Quite interesting. Thematically, seemed very of a piece with most of what he has done, even though there were a few scenes of true tenderness between young lovers, which is something very rarely seen further on. Filmically only minor things in place, a few jarring jumpcuts; some shocking violence, obliquely shown. Well and good. Haneke has apparantly made 11 tv-films - if the two-part Lemminge counts as two - but I think that with these two and The Castle, I'm not going to investigate it much further.

so should i see his adap of Kafka's The Castle?

http://www.filmlinc.org/films/the-castle/

It's just as absurd, amusing, and unfinished as the book.

It's bad!

I liked it better than a lot of his stuff, but I'm not a huge fan of his.

There you go morbs, yes/no/maybe. Take your pick.

Morbs - its not prime Haneke (made for TV), but as you don't like prime Haneke. It has a v good central performance (Ulrich Mühe)

i like a few, just not lately

btw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dr_U_cXgzBo

10-part English-lang TV series "set in a dystopian world"

http://deadline.com/2018/01/michael-haneke-first-tv-series-kelvins-book-fremantlemedia-ufa-fiction-1202270382/

Is Code Unknown good

It's great. It's my favourite Haneke.

Cool I might watch that tonight. Either that or L’eclisse

thanks for the recommendation, I enjoyed it quite a bit! I like The Piano Teacher more but that was great, and refreshingly optimistic

Over on The Current, @GarthGreenwell explores one of the quietest, most unassuming moments in Michael Haneke’s THE PIANO TEACHER (2001) and how it serves as a microcosm of his themes of control and sexuality: https://t.co/mZ3ssgYzu1 pic.twitter.com/i3W3BX2kCF

— Criterion Collection (@Criterion) May 13, 2019

i pretty much hated the original funny games. might be the first time i have strongly felt much much smarter than a filmmaker.

The Seventh Continent was quite something as a first film

One of those directors some of whose work I hate (Benny's Video) and love (71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance, but I haven't seen a lot of his biggest films yet.

Agreed. Stuff I hate (Benny's Video; Funny Games), stuff I love (Code Unknown; Cache; probably Time of the Wolf on re-watch), and really big ones I still haven't seen yet (The Piano Teacher; The White Ribbon).

No-one's yet explained to me why I should see Funny Games, a film apparently meant to implicate the viewer in the violence of spectatorship etc. etc. OK, I won't watch it and Haneke and I can both win.

I'm now disappointed to discover that the only scene with any energy in Benny's Video is actually a clip from Toxic Avenger.