Funny Games is a 1997 home invasion thriller film directed by the Austrian Michael Haneke. The plot of the film involves two killers who hold a family hostage and torture them with sadistic games. Home invasion is the crime of entering a private and occupied dwelling, with the intent of committing a crime and often while threatening the resident. ... It has been suggested that Thriller fiction be merged into this article or section. ... Michael Haneke A feature film is twenty-four lies per second. ... // Plot in literature, theater, movies According to Aristotles Poetics, a plot in literature is the arrangement of incidents that (ideally) each follow plausibly from the other. ... Flogging demonstration at Folsom Street Fair 2004. ...

Plot summary

The film begins with a well-to-do German family — Georg (Ulrich Mühe), his wife Anna (Susanne Lothar), his son Schorschi (Stefan Clapczynski) and their dog — arriving at their lake house. There, their neighbour introduces them to two young men who are apparently staying with him. Not long after that, one of the young men, Peter (Arno Frisch) asks Anna for eggs. Anna repeatedly gives Peter eggs but he drops them on the floor everytime as if it was an accident. Peter also 'accidentally' drops the family's only phone into the sink runing it. Paul also enters the house, asking to try Georg's golf clubs. He leaves the house with one of the golf clubs briefly before returning, the constant barking of the family dog suddenly coming to a halt. Anna realizes that Peter is dropping the eggs on purpose, and the two strangers claim they will not leave until they are given eggs. Anna asks Georg to force them out, but Paul breaks Georg's leg with the club and proceeds to hold the family hostage in the house. The games Peter and Paul make the family play form the bulk of the movie, including a game of 'Hot and Cold' that Paul plays with Anna until she discovers the corpse of the family dog. When Schorschi attempts to escape to a neighbour's house, he finds the neighbour's body on the floor, most likely murdered at the hands of Peter and Paul. He finds a gun and attempts to shoot Paul, who had chased him to the house, but fails and is brought back. Shortly thereafter, Peter kills Schorschi with the same gun Schorschi had tried to shoot Paul with. Peter and Paul mysteriously leave after the death of the boy, and Anna eventually escapes, but the men re-capture her and execute Georg. The next morning, Peter and Paul drown Anna and sail to another neighbor's house, again asking for eggs.

The final scene implies that the horror of the previous day will repeat with this next house. Also, the viewer can assume that the neighbour who originally introduced Peter and Paul as houseguests lost his life — and his family's — to the same fate as Georg, Anna and Schorschi.

Analysis

While the Funny Games may seem quite simple at a superficial level, some critics have taken the film to be a commentary on media violence. For example, one can argue that either the film's killers or the victims represent the viewer. Peter and Paul eagerly watch the captive family suffer, as people watching television or film watch characters endure physical and emotional trauma for their entertainment. Conversely, one could also posit that the family represents the viewer because they have no choice of whether to leave, similar to how one must endure adject violence in such a movie in order to view the conclusion. Media violence research attempts to establish a link between consuming media violence and subsequent violent behavior. ...

Also, the Paul character addresses the camera — and also the viewer, ostensibly — at several moments throughout the film. Prior to Anna finding the body of the slain family dog, for example, Paul winks at the camera. Most notably, Paul actually rewinds the film at one point. When Anna seizes the rifle and shoots Peter, Paul frantically searches for the VCR remote control and then rewinds the scene back to the point before Anna made her move. In the second play through, Paul does not let Anna touch the gun. Specifically in a proscenium theater, the term fourth wall applies to the imaginary invisible wall at the front of the stage in a theater through which the audience sees the action in the world of the play. ... A wink is an intentional facial expression, made by closing one eye and tensing the facial muscles above and below. ... A rifle is a firearm that uses a spiral groove cut into the barrel to spin a projectile (usually a bullet), thus improving accuracy and range of the projectile. ...

In addition, Peter and Paul repeatedly refer to each other with the names of famous television pairs, like Tom and Jerry or Beavis and Butt-head. Tom and Jerry may refer to: Tom and Jerry are the main characters in Life in London, or Days and Nights of Jerry Hawthorne and his elegant friend Corinthian Tom by Pierce Egan Tom and Jerry (MGM), a series of theatrical animated cartoons produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, featuring a... Beavis and Butt-Head is an American animated television series that originally aired on the cable television channel MTV from 1993 to 1997, and can now be seen in syndication on MTV2. ...

Living up to much of Haneke's directing style, the slow, unconventional pace of the film often induces boredom and frustration for the audience. Shortly after Schorschi is murdered and the two killers leave, there is a 10-minute-long, uninterrupted static take of Georg and Anna recovering from their loss, of which almost 5 minutes of it is of the two parents not moving. Also, a cutaway earlier in the film of a knife being dropped into the family boat, implies that later on it will become much more significant. When Peter and Paul take Anna boating at the end of the film, she indeed discovers the knife and uses it in an attempt to unbond herself. However, the killers quickly become aware of this, snatching the knife from her and throwing it into the water, much to the frustration of the audience who perhaps had expected Peter and Paul to eventually get their commuppance.

Violence

The version of Funny Games most widely available on DVD in the United States in not rated by the MPAA. Despite being unrated, the film does not feature graphic violence. Rather, much of the death and mutilation occurs off-screen.Template:Footer Movies Michael Haneke The official DVD logo. ... The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) is a non-profit trade association formed to advance the interests of movie studios. ... Graphic violence is the depiction of violence in media such as film, television, and video games. ...