Michael Haneke

Michael Haneke’s devastating feature debut. Calm waters of menacing monotony surrender to a crushing tsunami of bleak emotion. As the third act unfolded, I struggled to watch. It’s not what Haneke shows, but what he doesn’t show. We fill the gaps with ourselves. The dread overwhelms. I went in cold, only aware that it concerned a middle-class couple. I suggest you do the same, although I’ve already said too much.

Labeling director Michael Haneke’s sophomore effort “shocking” or “chilling” feels reductive. Haneke’s story of a young teen with an obsessive penchant for violent video proffers a detached—but not dispassionate—look into an abyss.

I appreciated director Michael Haneke’s willingness to experiment with his third feature, but the result underwhelmed. I’m not sure why.

In the late 90s, everyone was championing Scream’s revival of the horror genre, citing its self-aware script, and upending of the genre tropes. But the genuine evolutionary leap occurred a year later, in Austria, with this film. Besides resuscitating the home-invasion genre, Funny Games proves more self-reflexive and layered. All while packing the nihilistic punch Scream lacked.

A fascinating entry from writer/director Michael Haneke. Like his prior film, 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance, it follows several disparate characters united by a single incident. But while that film built toward its climax, Code Unknown opens with its converging incident then follows the rippling impacts through its character’s lives.