Thoughts on Funny Games
It’s very strange that Haneke remade Funny Games, as a “shot for shot” remake no less. The actors have been swapped but most of the rest remains the same, and while I really loved the original, I had to keep reminding myself of that very fact to properly appreciate the new version. It remains a very good film — either version — but being remade does make Haneke’s points and assumptions more obvious and questionable.
The main indictment of the film is that it’s recklessly violent and cruel, and Haneke himself claims it violates certain taboos of the acceptable in cinema. But it’s hard to imagine these are actually taboos to the audience that Haneke is making films for — certainly anybody who could stomach The Piano Teacher or Time of the Wolf isn’t going to shocked by this. And the film is only cruel if you’re siding with the “victims” of the film, but really, why would you? Except that they’re familiar and “normal” they’re meant to be disliked. They’re boring, they never take courageous or heroic action, and they never establish themselves as having personality. From the opening scene, wherein rather than really listening to classical music they’ve made a guessing game of it, the couple is meant to be scorned. They’re the set pieces in an absurdist drama, where the game is most certainly rigged. Comparatively, the villains are attractive, charming, and nuanced. You want to know about them, not so the victims.
The one other significant change with the remake is that it’s in English, so quite a few of the original exchanges come across clumsily. The initial request for eggs now plays out a bit too stiltedly, and Haneke reveals himself too much in some dialog, such as when the villains are asked why they don’t just kill the family — because “you shouldn’t forget the importance of entertainment.”
It’s a strange thing to remake, particularly in the way it’s remade. It’s perhaps smart that Haneke beat anybody else to the punch, but I find it hard to believe that was really in danger of happening. And I’m left with a lot of questions, mainly about Haneke’s intent. Does he realize that while his film is indeed fun, it’s subject matter has been trite for a long, long time? That his lead villain Michael Pitt has already played the cliche of nihilistic teen murderer in Murder By Numbers? That the game of doing a shot-by-shot remake has already had its day with Gus Van Sant’s Psycho? And that the extended sequence of the parent’s grief is hardly going to stand-up in history of cinema’s torturous moments after something like Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible?