so, FUNNY GAMES

[xfer]

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0119167

i watched this DVD last night...the guy who lent it to me said that it only had about ten seconds of violence in the whole movie, yet was one of the most brutal and horrifying films he'd ever seen. if he's not exactly right, I think he's at least somewhat so.

has anyone ever seen this film?

 

[FuSoYa]

could i borrow it? i just read a bit about it and am highly interested.

 

[xfer]

yeah, i don't need to give it back to him for a couple of weeks!

i also have your Dancer in the Dark still.

 

[goatschool]

yeah, i watched it. i hated it.

and on a personal level, i think they might have succeeded in whatever their intentions were. but i'm still not sure.

i've seen worse depicted or implied... but, if they had left it at that, terrible acts against average, ordinary characters, inflicted by very believable antagonists... uh, it might have been the next (final) step in the LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT school. i guess it could have worked on that level.

i think what got me was the nudge-wink smugness and how they depicted it. a waste of my time. it was cloying and preachy, whether they intended it or not.

the fact that it tried so hard makes me hate it. and i know they want you to hate the film. i'm doubting they were trying to make you hate it on so many different levels, though.

those chuck jones cartoons where he was fucking with the characters... i believe the apex of one episode is where the pencil starts to convert daffy duck into a blooming alien/flower quadraped WHILE DAFFY WHINES ABOUT IT worked so much better at dramatizing that THE VIEWER IS GETTING MANIPULATED.

 

[xfer]

ok, i agree with you on one front--the back of the box said shit like "draws the viewer into the funny games!" and stuff, but at the end of the movie, on that front, i was like "that's it?"

what i DID like was the very realistic portrayal of violence. that one, four-minute shot where NO ONE moves, and its just the one character taped up, staring at the blood smear and stuff i won't reveal for fear of spoilage is really cool. things like that, how the movie was very unhurried and un-Hollywoodlike and veriteish.

 

[goatschool]

yeah, the craft of video box blurbism is all jangly, as of late. that one is particularly shitty. besides the fact that the line has nothing to do with the film's direction, who indeed does want to be drawn into ANY funny games? who?

 

[xfer]

and the remote-control part was dumb.

but i did like the film overall, even though i found myself hating the innocent victims and wishing they would die faster.

 

[xfer]

and what IS up with recent video-box blurbism? i mean, I know Friday isn't the plot-heaviest movie, but you just have to watch it once to know that it's not about "Craig owes drug dealer Deebo money, and Deebo has come to COLLECT!".

 

[goatschool]

one of my favoritest movies is COMBAT SHOCK, which is low-budge sleaze from the late 80's. shot on video, downbeat shit about a starving vietnam vet living/dying in filthy staten island. great on so many levels.

the box, art and text, depicts it as a crazed chuck norris-style MISSING IN ACTION rambo-ness. it sort of rules. i guess it hasn't gotten all that much worse in recent years.

 

[xfer]

for some hot thread-on-thread action, i'll have you know i'm going to staten island for valentine's day.

 

[goatschool]

if you watched this film, you would recognize the need for a wire clothes hanger and a thumping synth soundtrack.

 

[xfer]

oh yeah...the other cool thing about FUNNY GAMES: soundtrack by John Zorn!

 

[azal]

that was a funny game.