a review of 趣味游戏

After viewing Michael Haneke's masterfully crafted Das weiße Band (The White Ribbon) and equally gripping Amour, I longed to also watch his Funny Games, but remained reluctant for a few years because of all the IMDb user reviews and film blog articles repeatedly emphasizing the ice-cold, sadistic nature of the movie. I expected Funny Games to be an abhorrent shocker, but I'm glad I decided to form my own opinion about it. Funny Games turned out to be another original, convincingly executed Haneke masterpiece, effectively blending nihilism and suspense with some of the blackest humor I've experienced in a film. It's remarkable how many Americans are completely repulsed and offended by this German psychological thriller where every act of violence is left to off-screen suggestion, while the vast majority of horror movies with explicit graphic violence comes from the US. Addendum: Check out Haneke's preceding Benny's Video as well, featuring the same lead actor: https://letterboxd.com/metinseven/film/bennys-video/ Benny's Video is clearly a partial blueprint for Funny Games. It's not as brilliant and masterful as Funny Games, but it gives you a similar uncanny feeling, somewhere between not knowing when to laugh and not knowing when to abhor.