Cache-a French film
Aug 15th, 2006 | 01:54 AM
#21
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 21,269
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The point is, who was or wasn't making the videos is beside the point, as the director himself has said.
I think the key to the movie is the almost throwaway reference to why the Algerian was an orphan in the first place: a French audience would (should) get it, but outside France it isn't really remembered that during protests in Paris in 1961 or 1962 against over-heavy police tactics in searching out sympathisers with the FLN, something like 200 Algerians simply disappeared after the riot police broke the demonstrations up. Bodies turned up in the Seine, but some people were never found.
Focussing on the "thriller" aspect of the film mirrors Georges's own obsession with the videos themselves (notice how there are red splashes in the corners of both the videos and other scenes supposedly outside the videos, like the splashes on the postcards he gets sent). It diverts attention away from the question of responsibility for what happened to this particular Algerian as a child, to his parents, and to the children of Algerians in France today. Georges never actually listens to what either the Algerian or his son have to say, even as he demands to know what's going on. He thinks he tries, but he never really "gets it" - as with his wife and son.
I was tipped off about the final scene, but I couldn't see it, I must say. Even if I had, it wouldn't have altered what I took to be the point of the film, though it might, if anything, have left a more positive feeling.
I think the key to the movie is the almost throwaway reference to why the Algerian was an orphan in the first place: a French audience would (should) get it, but outside France it isn't really remembered that during protests in Paris in 1961 or 1962 against over-heavy police tactics in searching out sympathisers with the FLN, something like 200 Algerians simply disappeared after the riot police broke the demonstrations up. Bodies turned up in the Seine, but some people were never found.
Focussing on the "thriller" aspect of the film mirrors Georges's own obsession with the videos themselves (notice how there are red splashes in the corners of both the videos and other scenes supposedly outside the videos, like the splashes on the postcards he gets sent). It diverts attention away from the question of responsibility for what happened to this particular Algerian as a child, to his parents, and to the children of Algerians in France today. Georges never actually listens to what either the Algerian or his son have to say, even as he demands to know what's going on. He thinks he tries, but he never really "gets it" - as with his wife and son.
I was tipped off about the final scene, but I couldn't see it, I must say. Even if I had, it wouldn't have altered what I took to be the point of the film, though it might, if anything, have left a more positive feeling.
Aug 15th, 2006 | 02:01 AM
#22
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 21,269
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This is the quote from the director that I had in mind: It's at
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/filmandmu...37688,00.html:
Regarding the question of "whodunnit", a rather po-faced Haneke has stated vehemently: "I'm not going to give anyone this answer ... If you come out wanting to know who sent the tapes, you didn't understand the film. To ask this question is to avoid asking the real question the film raises, which is more: how do we treat our conscience and our guilt and reconcile ourselves to living with our actions?
"People are only asking 'whodunnit?' because I chose to use the genre, the structure of a thriller, to address the issues of blame and conscience, and these methods of narrative usually demand an answer. But my film isn't a thriller and who am I to presume to give anyone an answer on how they should deal with their own guilty conscience?"
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/filmandmu...37688,00.html:
Regarding the question of "whodunnit", a rather po-faced Haneke has stated vehemently: "I'm not going to give anyone this answer ... If you come out wanting to know who sent the tapes, you didn't understand the film. To ask this question is to avoid asking the real question the film raises, which is more: how do we treat our conscience and our guilt and reconcile ourselves to living with our actions?
"People are only asking 'whodunnit?' because I chose to use the genre, the structure of a thriller, to address the issues of blame and conscience, and these methods of narrative usually demand an answer. But my film isn't a thriller and who am I to presume to give anyone an answer on how they should deal with their own guilty conscience?"
Aug 15th, 2006 | 05:32 AM
#23
Joined: Dec 2004
Posts: 2,013
Likes: 0
I missed what you were supposed to see at the end, but my friend saw it. I'm not sure it necessarily clears up things anyway. Definitely an interesting and thought-provoking movie, but it did leave my a bit frustrated at the end ... guess it was supposed to.
