The White Ribbon (2009) Review

I have read much about Michael Haneke, but have never seen a film of his until this one.Haneke is a genuinely polarising filmmaker, some thinking he's a great artist and others who think he's a shock entertainer with no talent.So I went to see what all the hoopla was about with this film, which many people are calling his best.

This is a great film.

The White Ribbon is a deeply haunting, cerebral, strange, rewarding film, one that will make you think for days afterwards (a critic reviewing this film said it would haunt you for days.Try weeks!).Shot in beautiful, shimmering black and white (in fact, this is some of the best photography in a film that I've ever seen), the story revolves around a German village just prior to WWI, and the strange, eerie, creepy, and unsettling things going on around it.In some ways, The White Ribbon is reminiscent of unsettling horror films like Dreyer's Vampyr and many J-horror films (like Kurosawa's Cure) where things are deliberately left unanswered and the loose ends really puzzle you on a very deep, subconscious level.Many films have loose ends but I don't think I've ever seen a film have as many loose ends as this one does, but that's a good thing.The film even starts with a narrator saying "I think it happened this way.I'm not really sure".There are many nasty things going on, and many have suggested this is due to the repressed, religious upbringing of the village, but I'm not sure.To Haneke's credit, he never answers these things directly, and he also doesn't answer them in interviews that he's done.This makes the film far more effective and deeply troubling.Even writing about the film now makes me uncomfortable.It's that haunting, and that it is such a success on the arthouse circuit (it has already won the Palm d'Or at Cannes and just won a Golden Globe for Best Foreign film) is very encouraging.

While I can't judge a filmmaker on only one film, I think Haneke may in fact be the real thing.I plan on renting many more of his films (Cache and the original Funny Games), and I look forward to seeing more of his films.

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Product Description:
WHEN STRANGE ACCIDENTS OCCUR IN A GERMAN VILLAGE, THEY GRADUALLY TAKE ON THE CHARACTER OF A PUNISHMENT RITUAL.

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