Funny Games (2007)

by Thomas Flanagan (guest blogger)

Warning: Spoilers follow.

2007’s Funny Games, much like its 1997 Austrian predecessor, chronicles the demise of an upper middle-class family as they are harangued, tormented, tortured, and eventually murdered by two malicious, albeit eloquent, youths (Michael Pitt and Brady Corbet). The movie opens with the family serenely driving to their summer home, amicably listening to a piece by Handel. The harmony elicited by that composition is interrupted by the cacophonous sound of Naked City ’s discordant song “Bonehead,” signaling to the audience that a nightmarish, macabre experience lay in wait for the unsuspecting family. As the family arrives we see that their neighbors are apprehensively entertaining two teenagers dressed in all white apparel. The two groups tensely exchange pleasantries, and then the family departs to their home to begin to arrange things for their stay. Shortly after arriving. One of the young men arrives asking to borrow eggs for the next-door neighbors. This marks the beginning of the hellish journey the family must undertake as the two adolescents kidnap the family and force them to participate in a series of charades where survival is the grand prize. Ultimately the entire family is massacred by this “gruesome twosome”, after which the duo eagerly arrives at the home of the next credulous victim, continuing the circle of lunacy and butchery.

Now I will relieve you, the moviegoer, of the burden of having to watch this beastly, rubbish film. The problem with this particular motion picture is its potential. The movie itself is visually and emotionally breathtaking. The cinematography is state of the art; the wardrobe and set were elegantly designed (the camera work combined with the Long Island backdrop truly gives the feeling of a vibrant New England morning at the film’s onset). The cast was not only well selected, all involved performed quite admirably. Tim Roth turns in an astonishing portrayal of the patriarch of the family, and Naomi Watts also delivers a solid performance. I was especially pleased with the performance of young Devon Gearhart, who played the family’s son. I often find myself thoroughly unimpressed with child actors, but this young man captured the panic of a youngster thrust into a ludicrous, atrocious situation (the fear he exudes is palpable when the gun he has aimed at Michael Pitt’s character misfires). And speaking of Michael Pitt, everyone knows he is a quite talented thespian. Thus, with all of the other elements in place for a noteworthy picture, it was ultimately the writing that damned this film.

The central point of this film is to illustrate to the viewer how inherently violent we as a people are. As previously stated, Michael Pitt does a superior job in depicting a character the viewer will love to despise. And justly so, we as the viewer want to see this character unreservedly punished. This, however, never occurs. Instead, in the only moment when vengeance can be exacted, Naomi Watts’s character shoots the dim-witted Peter. An infuriated Paul grabs a remote, rewinds the movie to the part immediately preceding Peter’s slaying, and knocks the gun from her hands. The couple then proceeds to ultimately castigate the family. Intermittently throughout the film as the chaos is ensuing the character of Paul will break the fourth wall, directly addressing the audience members, mocking us and continuously reasserting that the family is doomed. Therein lies the flaw with this picture. This movie directly, personally insults you as the viewer. This is not a general indictment of society, as was the case with A Clockwork Orange. In that particular story, Alex had to triumph in order to perfectly illustrate author Anthony Burgess’s point. In Funny Games Peter and Paul win merely to infuriate you the audience member.

The error in the logic of infuriation is that Funny Games seems to be geared towards two moviegoing minds—the arthouse film buff crowd and the horror enthusiasts. When the film buff views Funny Games, they will neither be excited nor enjoy the trite message that we as humans are inherently violent, and if those fans cannot support that message, the horror-movie purist (which I admittedly relate to) will detest it. It’s no secret that humans are beastly, and this fact is not only embraced by horror-movie fans, it is lauded. Give us violence and give us manslaughter, and for everything sacred don’t try to make us ashamed of it! Just look at one of the most widely accepted horror films ever. Wes Craven’s 1972 picture Last House on the Left serves as gourmet cuisine for the horror-movie purist. In fact, one of the most memorable scenes occurs when one of the tormentors of the murdered girl has a dream where the child’s parents have him fastened to an operating chair, calmly performing invasive and rather unnecessary dental work. As horror movie fans, our only regret was that this action was taken only in the confines of a dream. Thus, as it relates to Funny Games, of course we only want the worst for Peter and Paul, and it is impossible to make us abashed by this desire. We don’t shy away from implacable intentions, we proclaim them. Don’t pompously preach to us the cautionary tales of allowing our bloodlust to take hold, feed us! By not “wetting our beaks” it is impossible for us as a people to not be completely subdued by this film.

Sadly enough the need for reprisal for a subpopulation of the audience did not escape the grasp of Michael Haneke. Haneke was well aware that the horror-movie fanatic would never accept ignominy for his or her barbaric nature, thus he tried to create two despicable characters that a subset of the population would root for. This is not uncommon in the genre of fright, as John Carpenter, George Romero, and numerous directors from the Friday the 13th series can attest. Clive Barker created a character of Pinhead in Hellraiser, and over the course of seven movies, Pinhead performed no charitable or merciful deed, yet he still managed to receive fan mail. In addition, purists have even latched on to the Groucho Marx-loving, eccentric Firefly family of Rob Zombie fame (although I find them quite irritating). The Fireflys, Pinhead and the Cenobites, Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Hannibal Lecter, and Michael Myers are all villainous, murdering scum; however, there is some innate quality that makes them highly attractive to horror-movie fans. Some enjoy being frightened by characters such as Krueger and Voorhees because they understand that due to some past traumatic event they were created, not born. Many appreciate Lecter’s wit, his artistic taste, and his intellect. A case can even be made that Myers’s silence adds great mystery and depth to his character. This is nothing to celebrate in the one-dimensional, grating characters of Peter and Paul. They share none of Lecter’s charm, there is no backstory that exists with Krueger and Voorhees, and unlike Myers, they will not keep their mouths shut. Being subjected to 111 minutes of Peter and Paul’s murderous spree is equivalent to watching a movie about a spoiled, rich kid who faces no obstacle and respects no other person, and at the end of the film ends up with Diane Kruger. It’s Andie choosing Blane over Duckie, or if Gene Hackman’s character in Unforgiven arrests Clint Eastwood and ruthlessly beats him to death, instead of the tremendously gratifying frontier justice that befell sheriff Bill Daggett. The trailer for this film is accompanied by Grieg’s “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” and I believe this is the perfect vehicle for this film. That particular composition evokes feeling of exasperation, irritation, and aggravation for me, and that is exactly what this movie does. This movie is insidiously irksome, thus the two go hand in hand.

If you enjoy the soothing sound of a root canal, relish in the hollow feeling of just having been dumped, or are energized when vandals destroy your property, I believe this is an excellent film for you. However, if you love film, it’s mysticism, it’s ability to transport you to different worlds via imagination, and motion picture’s marvelous ability to inspire, this is not the picture for you. If you encounter this movie at any point in your travels, I encourage you to leave it where you found it, which is most likely in the bargain-bin of some second-rate gas station.

Rating: 0 stars

Trash Humpers (2009)

By Thomas Flanagan (guest blogger)

As the film’s title so brazenly implies, Trash Humpers is truly a picture that pulls no punches. The drama, shot with a VHS camcorder, follows the exploits of four individuals shrouded in senior citizenesque masks as they proceed to perform activities honoring the movie’s namesake. Over an unspecified time period, the gang partakes in multiple acts of perversion and horror, including burglary, prostitution, corruption, kidnapping, and even murder (and yes, the film does deliver many scenes of the dry-humping of trash receptacles). For 78 minutes the viewer is treated to a nightmarish reality which appears to have been edited by a schizophrenic, and by the conclusion of the movie, the only certainty the audience is left with is that the individuals shooting this film are criminally deranged.

However, It is the desire to shock which hampers this film. Director Harmony Korine’s self-described portrait of the current “American landscape” revolves around a series of "park garages, back alleyways, and beautiful lamp posts that light up the gutter." It is this middle-class ambiance that Korine is able to so masterfully portray. Anyone familiar with Korine’s work can derive the “junior high” mood which is palpable in all of his movies. The sometimes barbarous need for carnal pleasures, the loneliness and isolation, and the frightening absurdity which plague cities like Pulaski, Tennessee; Brandon, Mississippi; Pork Van, Utah; Wampum, Pennsylvania; and Visalia, California (thank-you Platoon), Korine expertly captures these absurdities via motion picture and presents them in such a manner that repressed pre-teen memories are inevitably conjured. In the 1995 film KIDS (directed by Larry Clark, featuring a screenplay written by Korine), the audience is horrified as we follow an HIV-stricken teen in his quest to “de-virginize” as many adolescent girls as possible. However, it is impossible not to recall many of our own desires to experience intimacy at so early an age and our failure to understand sex’s gravity (it is implicit that none care to tangle with these issues under the veil of AIDS). 2002’s Ken Park more blatantly displays these “tween” primal urges, but importantly it captures the previously described mind-numbing insanity that is prevalent in American suburbs. It is also in this film, however, in which we see the errors of Korine’s excess.

Korine’s brilliance resides in the harnessing of his talents. In Chuck Klosterman’s book Fargo Rock City, Klosterman questions the fine line of guitar virtuosos and their contribution to the genre of heavy metal in terms of technical wizardry versus greatness. A guitarist such as Eddie Van Halen was capable of delivering fingertip-melting solos, but the band’s songs and production often favored David Lee Roth’s vocals. Thus, the listener was granted only snippets of the guitarist’s skill, leaving the captivated guitarphile yearning for more, while the casual music-lover was never subjected to the technical arrogance pervasive in a guitarist such as Yngwie Johann Malmsteen (as Klosterman used as an example). Diamond Dave’s “prison” is similar to the service director Larry Clark was able to provide for Korine. In KIDS we are treated to only two images of teen sexual encounters, both of which are more vulgar in the feelings they evoke than in their imagery. In Ken Park the union between Clark and Korine began to dissolve, and we see the consequence of that divorce as Ken Park devolves into a shock flick. Fast-forward to modern day, and we see the result of what Kramer from Seinfeld would call “unbridled enthusiasm.” Trash Humpers has the ability to shock the audience (a particularly disturbing scene involves the foursome’s interaction with what at first appears to be a mild-mannered church-going youth), but in his need to instill emotion, Korine leaves the audience numb to his musings. Throughout the film the gang elicits hyena-like shrieks to punctuate moments of abnormality. There is little doubt this was intended to showcase the horrifying nature of the group, however all it leaves is an irritated movie-goer. In addition between many of the stomach-turning scenes it appears as if Korine had no answer on how to bridge the gap, thus these moments are characterized by the peeping Toms performing mundane or played activities in which the viewer’s ears are unfortunately subjected to the piercing hyena cackles (how many scenes can you watch of masked individuals attempting to hump trash before it gets quite stale?). By going for broke, Korine plays his hand far too early and leaves the audience quite accustomed to his act. This is highly disappointing when viewed under the context of what Korine is capable of under the proper guidance.

For those familiar with Korine’s work, I would recommend this film. Despite the annoying feature characters and the multiple dead moments, when the film delivers, it is quite poignant. Korine’s own character’s treatise on his actions is particularly thought-provoking, and the “Three Little Devils” song interspersed at various points in the film adds a truly haunting aura. For those who are novices to Harmony Korine, perhaps a screening of previous directoral efforts Gummo or Julien Donkey-Boy would be necessary before trying to size-up this film.

Rating: 2 ½ stars