Funny Games

Michael Haneke's 1997 version of "Funny Games" is a work that's purposefully focused on challenging the limits of the viewer. How much are you willing to stand? That's the question, and Haneke answered with shocking, twisted dividends with this detailed depiction of two young men who play a series of escalating "games" with a bourgeois family being held captive at their vacation home. The torture begins as psychological, then devolves into the slightly physical, threatening bloodshed at every moment. All the while, it's hugely engrossing – and deeply unsettling.

This film came before the outpouring of the United States' "torture porn" fetish, where films like "Saw" and "Hostel" began populating American cinemas and entertaining audiences with sadistic genre work. It's no surprise, then, that Haneke eventually remade the film – shot for shot – in the English language for American audiences. He had his finger on the pulse before the heart of the genre had really even started to beat. In its new Criterion Collection release, my only complaint about the 1997 "Funny Games" is that it doesn't include the 2007 American version, as it would've been an interesting double feature (in packaging, at the very least, but also as a fascinating cinematic comparison).

Regardless, this is a seminal Haneke work, and it mines the twisted pleasures that viewers often seek in their entertainment. The filmmaker pushes the buttons, then asks, "Are you not entertained?" And that's the great thing about the film; some will hate it, and others will be endlessly engaged. It all depends on your tolerance for the atrocious plot developments that ensue over the course of the narrative.

Bonus features on The Criterion Collection Blu-ray release include:

� New interviews with Haneke and actor Arno Frisch
� New interview with film historian Alexander Horwath
� Press conference from the 1997 Cannes Film Festival featuring Haneke and actors Susanne Lothar and Ulrich M�he
� Trailer
� New English subtitle translation
� An essay by critic Bilge Ebiri

"Funny Games"
Blu-ray
$31.96
https://www.criterion.com/films/28836-funny-games