funny ha ha

[bitterfig]

Yesterday I went to see Funny Games.  It’s directed by Austrian Michael Haneke, best know for controversial films such as The Piano Teacher (2001) and Cache (2005).  Funny Games is rather peculiar in that it is a shot-by-shot English language remake of a film of the same title that Haneke made in 1997.

Comments

[steve98052]

The reviews I've seen of Funny Games seem to follow the consensus that the acting and directing are great, but the story is pretentious, pretending to mock torture-porn while being torture-porn. It's not on my list.

As for remaking a movie in English, I think the idea can have merit. I haven't seen the original Dutch Interview (written by Theodor Holman, directed by Theo van Gogh, but the English-language remake is wonderful. Theo van Gogh (great-great-grand-nephew of the painter) planned to do English-language remakes of three of his films, but he was murdered before they entered production. Steve Buscemi (who had been cast for van Gogh's remake, I think) adapted the screenplay to English, directed it, and played the male lead (with Sienna Miller).

What's the point? I think it's defensible in the same way that many different stage companies can do productions of the same play. Sure, a stage production can't be replayed over and over like a film can; it needs a cast, crew, and set for every showing. But remakes are still worthwhile if they bring something new and worthwhile to the film. In the case of Interview, the language and a little about the setting were new. The film, with only two actors on screen (except for a brief prologue scene), would adapt very well to stage.

[bitterfig]

It's interesting, for all the comparisons to torture-porn Funny Games has gotten I noticed that it made a deliberate point of having all the worst violence take place off camera. I haven't seen any of the Saw or Hostel but I'm under the impression that they're very much about a camera that doesn't look away.

Thanks so much for reminding me about Interview. I was really disappointed about missing it during its all too brief run in theaters. I'd added it to my netflix queue before it came out on DVD but then sort of forgotten about it so it was languishing at about 487. I've since bumped it up to the top ten.