Review of Caché (2005) by Jesse O — 30 Jan 2011

You know, of the 3 Michael Haneke movies I've seen (this one, the Funny Games remake, and The White Ribbon) they've all had endings that end up creating more questions than they answer. And I mean that in a good way, because, Michael's movies are pretty complex and smartly-written so it creates interesting debates with people who watched the movies.

The ending in this movie doesn't feel cheap at all, because I'm perfectly aware that Michael wanted the movie to be this way, as opposed to other filmmakers who just don't even bother working in an ending that makes sense (IE: These thriller/horror movies that are pretty straight-forward until their twist, at which point they stop making sense).

I saw Michael's interview on the special features of this DVD and he comes across as a really smart man who refuses to confine himself to the conventional way of making movies. That's probably why his movies don't go far past the art-house audience, at least over here.

Like in The White Ribbon, he didn't use any musical score in this movie. He just let the actors' performances speak for themselves. It worked better in The White Ribbon, as the performances has a lot more dramatic depth than this movie, but it still says a lot about Michael that he doesn't GUIDE your emotions with a score, again he just lets the performances speak for themselves.

And this movie is great because of that and because it's a movie that just holds your attention. But anyway, back to the ending a bit. I had figured out that there wasn't going to be a perfect, hollywood ending to this movie about halfway through.

And I thought to myself "I'm going to be so pissed off, because we're not going to find out who was sending the tapes" And it never bothered me at all, actually. This movie is so much more complex than that it's not even funny.

It has some interesting ideas and some intriguing messages about society, guilt, sense of morality, lack of communication/trust. What I found to be incredibly interesting from Michael Haneke's interview was how he decided to present the conflict.

The video tapes destroyed (as far as we can see on screen) Anne and Georges' marriage. There's a lack of trust between them because Georges refuses to communicate with his wife. In mainstream movies, this conflict (in the end) would bring the couple closer TOGETHER, instead of driving them apart.

And this is all just such a ridiculous idea, because it WOULD be a source of great stress in any marriage. It wouldn't bring you closer together. So I found that incredibly interesting how Haneke expressed how he wanted to portray the marriage and it's pretty much great, because both actors perform these roles believably.

Quite frankly, this movie is pretty excellent without actually DOING a lot of fancy shit. It may bore some people, but hey...this type of movie won't be everyone's cup of tea. I definitely recommend it.

If you watch it with someone else, it's definitely bound up to bring up some discussion, which is a great thing that adds to a movie and how memorable it ends up being.