Funny Games
List Price:
Our Price: $3.87
You Save: $24.11 (86%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $2.47 (click here)
Category: DVD
See more DVD releases
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
DVD Cover Information
Actor: Michael Pitt, Naomi Watts, Tim RothBrand: WATTS,NAOMI
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language); French (Dubbed); Spanish (Dubbed)
Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.77:1
Running Time: 112 minutes
Published: 2008-06-01
DVD Release Date: 2008-06-10
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Warner Home Video
Product features:
- Condition: New
- Format: DVD
- AC-3; Color; Dolby; Dubbed; DVD; Subtitled; Widescreen; NTSC
Movie Reviews of Funny Games
Movie Review: A film of deep humanism and honesty.
Summary: 5 Stars
So you like "horror films?" Or perhaps you enjoy "action" or "suspense" thrillers where, at some point, people end up getting taken hostage or killed or something along those lines. The fact is that violence, more perhaps than even sexuality, is something to which we have in become innured, desensitized to, particularly in our "entertainment," namely, films, books, television, music. This film, which I believe to be one of the most moral ever made, is exactly what it is advertised to be: a depiction of a family taken hostage and tortured.
It is striking, surely, that people who sought out and consumed this film, knowing what it was about before going into it, critisize the film for its violence and the repulsive, unpsetting nature of its scenes. So, what did they "expect" instead? Fun torture? Sexy violence? A hostage laugh riot? All the tropes of the genre are here -- for instance, Ann gets stripped to her underwear and runs around half naked; except, on director Hanele's watch, you aren't allowed to get off on it. It's not fun. It's horrible. It's disgusting. It's deeply sad and unsettling. But why?
In most films which exploit violence and terror, the "trick" is that suspense gets built up (e.g. the family gets taken hostage), but then at some point a "catharsis" is allowed the audience -- the tormentors get killed, the protagonists escape, revenge at last! We get a release. We get to "enjoy" the violence commited by our protagonists, in which we are vicariously allowed to "get off" on it because we have been allowed to feel their violence is justified because of the bad deeds the antagonists perpetrated against the victims. This allows us to enjoy the experience of torture and horror because we know that it's justifed. The horror of the victims is the "means" to the "ends" of enjoying the violent retribution and payback.
But here, there is no catharsis for the audience. Ever. This is why it is so unsettling. We are not allowed to enjoy the violence. The only characters we can ever side with are the two young men -- but we are never given any points of reference regarding their lives or backstory -- we cannot connect to them or sympathize with them. Their violence is pure. Not justification given. The audience must then ask themselves, "Why is violence not enjoyable in this film?" The answer being, "Because we are not given any justification through which we can trick ourselves, allow ourselves, to enjoy it. It is pure violence. It has no meaning. It is unrational and senseless. It is violence in its pure state, uncorrupted by our thoughts about it, rationalization of it, escuses for it."
And we as audience members are culpable. We wanted to see this film -- about a family being tormented -- and therefore, we, in effect, are responsible for the horrors we then have to endure. We are the cause. It's as if we "hired" the two young men to do what they do. That is the only meaning of the violence in the film. It is there because we wanted it.
Don't let the claims that this film exploits violence fool you. It is one of the most moral, honest films ever made. It is about violence and what it is and what it means to be "entertained" by it. Sure you will be disgusted by this film. I truly hope you are. I hope you are utterly repulsed by what you see. It means there is still hope for you, that you are not like the sociopathic young men you feel nothing whatever about the violence they see or cause.
This film is about the importance of self regulated moral action. In the world of this film, and, arguably, in the real world itself, there is no divine intervention which prevents violent acts commited by one human being against another, there is nothing to stop one person from hurting another at any time. All our order and structure in society is only there because we choose to abide by certain rules of conduct. But no one really has to do it. So why should we? Why shouldn't we torture, kill, and torment? It comes down to individual free choice regarding whether or not you wish to live in an ordered, rational world. If you do, then there's Kant's Categorical Imperative: #1) Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law, " and #2) "Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means to an end."
Be brave. See this film. We should not lose sight of what violence is in and of itself beyond our justifications for it. Morality is a choice and we should never condone violence unless we don't mind it being perpetrated against ourselves as well...
Summary of Funny Games
Genre: Suspense
Rating: R
Release Date: 10-JUN-2008
Media Type: DVD
Similar DVD Movies
Hard CandyLions Gate; Release date: 2006-09-19; DVD
Best price: $5.07
Price in other shops:
High Tension (Unrated Widescreen Edition)Lions Gate; Release date: 2005-10-11; Published: 2005-10-01; DVD
Best price: $5.44
Price in other shops:
MartyrsGenius; Release date: 2009-04-28; DVD
Best price: $6.99
Price in other shops:
Antichrist (The Criterion Collection)IMG; Release date: 2010-11-09; DVD
Best price: $20.80
Price in other shops:
Last DaysHBO HOME VIDEO; Release date: 2005-10-25; DVD
Best price: $2.17
Price in other shops:
The Dreamers (Original Uncut NC-17 Version)Fox; Release date: 2004-07-13; DVD
Best price: $4.03
Price in other shops:
The StrangersFISHER,ALEX; Release date: 2008-10-21; DVD
Best price: $4.33
Price in other shops:
The White RibbonSON; Release date: 2010-06-29; DVD
Best price: $4.85
Price in other shops:
Cache (Hidden)Sony; Release date: 2006-06-27; DVD
Best price: $6.50
Price in other shops:
Funny GamesKNV; Release date: 2006-05-16; DVD
Best price: $15.92
Price in other shops: