0:09 I always find categorizing things difficult, but Funny Games is definitely not a genre film. It reflects on the genre. 0:22 But it's not just that specific genre. It uses the thriller genre... to reflect on manipulation via the medium itself I could have used a different genre, but a suspense film lends itself perfectly to showing an audience how easily they're manipulated. 0:58 It's a long story how this film ended up as it finally did. I was still working in Baden-Baden as a script editor for a German broadcaster. I shared an office with a colleague my age, and whenever we had nothing else to do, we'd talk about ideas for things we could do. That's when I first talked about it. Then I wrote a first draft of a script. That must have been 1967 or 1968. It was called "Weekend." It was about a married couple who drive out to their weekend home, and at the same time this young guy who's sort of accidentally committed a crime has stumbled across the place and holed up there. 2:01 So the couple arrives and suddenly encounters him, and everything develops from there. All their marital conflicts surface, and in the end the woman kills her husband. A typical thriller-type story. So I wrote that script and sent it to the German Film Fund. They actually offered me a grant of 300,000 German marks, which isn't enough to make a film, of course. And since I knew no one in the film industry, I just forgot about it. I went on working in TV, then theater, then TV again, and the script just lay in my drawer. But at some point I thought I'd take another look. I agonized over it and rewrote the story a bit and came up with these two young guys. Hello? Hello. Sorry to disturb you. I'm from next door. I saw you earlier when you stopped at the gate. 3:04 Yes, of course. Please come in. Hurry up. We're eating in 10 minutes. What is it? The cliché would be to have this bourgeois family, and suddenly these "underdogs" would show up, out to exact social revenge by killing them. But these guys are in tennis outfits. They're well-educated and more articulate than the couple. Look at him. You really think he comes from a deprived background? Right. He's a spoiled little shithead... This isn't a clash of different cultural classes or different social circles. That's a different film, one the Americans would make... like The Desperate Hours... with Humphrey Bogart, about a gangster who takes a family hostage. I'll leave that to the Americans. I find that too predictable. 4:06 Here it's people from their own social milieu who do it. And they can do it at any time. Our neighbor just has to ring the bell. Paul. This is Peter. Come here, Tom. Have you no manners? Shake Georg's hand. They're the classic comedy duo. That's why they have a variety of names, like Tom and Jerry, Laurel and Hardy, the white clown and the regular clown. These are all stereotypes we know, and they're presented here as stereotypes too. They aren't naturalistic characters. They act in a naturalistic manner - not even that. They act realistically. But the framework in which they function is one you see through very quickly. One is intelligent, the other is dumber. 5:09 But the dumb one is fatter, so he's stronger physically, and so on. They're all preexisting stereotypes. And these stereotypes are made clear to the audience through the choice of names as well. But that doesn't stop the audience from believing it if the story is told in a compelling way. The challenge when using these clichés is to use them in such a way that the story remains plausible. With stereotypes, people usually switch off. "I know all that already." You have to craft the situation so precisely that viewers never get the chance to say that. They'll notice it yet still go on believing what's happening, even if it's absurd. It's not easy... but that was the task here. The task and the challenge. 6:10 We'll bet that - What time is it? Twenty to 9:00. We'll bet that in, let's say, 12 hours, all three of you will be kaput. The film works because these two groups are acting in different films. The couple and their child are in a drama, and the two delinquents are acting in a farce. And I told the actors that: f♫Don't play along in the others ' drama." Okay. As they say on TV: The bet's on! What shall we do now? That's not just a formal trick. It's like that in the real world too. The big mistake when poor actors play scenes with each other is that the one plays along with the other's suffering, which is all wrong. If I'm the one inflicting the pain, 7:13 I can enjoy that and not play along in the drama. Otherwise it becomes terribly melodramatic and dull. In reality, the villain is truly villainous. He enjoys the fact that others are suffering. That's what makes it so unbearable. It's usually made more bearable by having the villain demonstrate compassion for the audience's sake. What makes this film so harsh is the fact these two guys are simply having fun. They amuse themselves with the lives and suffering of other people the same way little boys tear the legs or wings off a fly. It's the same kind of "innocent" pleasure in evil. We'll play a nice little game: Kitten in the Bag. It's fun. You'll see. 8:17 Don't panic. Nothing will happen to him. I said it was a fun game. A family game. Daddy can play too, so he doesn't get bored. Then later I got the idea to make it into a film about the medium itself, a self-reflexive film... and I looked for ways to incorporate that self-reflexivity. So what you'd probably consider the theme of the film was the last element added, due to how media had developed in the meantime. 9:00 In the preceding years, I'd been thinking a lot about the responsibility of an artist in the media. Television as a medium plays a huge role in 71 Fragments and in Benny's Video too: the way the media make reality itself unreal. I had to approach the question by finding a form that draws attention to itself. There was a film by Tony Richardson called Tom Jones, with Albert Finney. I remember seeing it when I was young. It was an incredibly lush, funny, and sensual film. Right in the middle of a chase, the guy turns to the camera and says... "I hope they don't catch me!" Or something like that. That was a real shock... one of the most powerful moments of insight for me in cinema. I was suddenly made aware of my role 10:03 and of how completely the story had me in its clutches. I thought it was brilliant. That was at least 20 years before I made this film, but it was always in the back of my mind. This action of breaking the fourth wall... is a great way to make things transparent. So I asked myself: How do I do that in a so-called "realistic" film where viewers fall for my tricks ? How do I make them realize it? Cold. I wanted to build things up. I give viewers an opportunity right away. At first they're confused. "What's going on here?" "Did I misread that?" That's intentional, so that viewers aren't sure: Is he really winking at the audience? Or at someone behind him? That's the first moment of confusion, followed by more and more. 11:05 These little ruptures occur again and again. What do you think? You think they stand a chance? You're on their side, aren't you? Who are you betting on? I can tear people away from the story, but five minutes later they're at my mercy again as long as I keep the suspense up. We're not up to feature-film length yet. Is that enough? You want a real ending, with plausible plot development, right? It's hard for the audience to get out of this endless loop. Warm, warmer, hot! So when I started writing the story, my intention became to break all existing taboos and turn them on their heads. One mustn't harm animals, so right off, the dog is killed. You don't kill the one who's eliminated. You kill the one who's finally left. - He tried to run. - So what? 12:05 You don't just start firing away. Have you no sense of timing? Of course that didn't make it easy for the actors. The scene right after the boy's death is a fixed take Iasting 10 minutes. That wasn't easy for them. They managed it only because they were such wonderful actors, because if not - I intentionally filmed it as a wide shot. You can't film a person who's suffering that intensely as a close-up. It becomes obscene, pornographic. You can't do that. The more real it is, the more pornographic. We had to give them the opportunity to preserve their dignity, even though they've lost their dignity in that situation. I'll get a knife. And that worked well. We shot that scene just three times. 13:08 Much more wouldn't have been possible. The first take was very good, but I suggested one more. But two minutes in, I could see they'd run out of steam. So we did it again after a break, and that's what you see. But I'd gone to their dressing room beforehand and laid out in detail what was going to happen when : how long the shock would last when they don't say anything, when he'd start screaming. We discussed all of that. Then I said... "Take as long as you want. We'll wait upstairs." We all took our seats upstai rs. I told everyone to be quiet. "They might be up in five minutes or in 30." Then they came in, sat down, and played the scene. Everyone was silent afterwards... including me. It was amazing. 14:09 Of course, it helps when you know and admire your actors, and when you love each other. That's an incredible foundation to work from. I'm faithful as a director. If I work well with someone, I'll always come back to them. It makes life so much easier. No need to start all over with earning each other's trust. That's always the hardest part. When you first work with an actor, you're both taking a risk. "Will we understand each other?" They may be very good, but they may speak a different language emotionally. These were actors I'd worked with several times, and we'd become friends. Suse and Uli were my absolute favorite actors. That's why I could dare to do this scene in one take. I knew they could do it, that it wouldn't go off the rails. 15:11 You can't afford to do that with actors... whose abilities you're unsure of 15:24 I wrote the story. It developed slowly. You don't write a story like that from beginning to end. One thing led to another. I hadn't filled in all the details yet. But I always build the framework all the way to the end. So I made it all the way to the child's death. Up to that point it had been relatively simple. Then I managed to introduce another element of delay when she gets away but then is brought back. But I couldn't get past that point. So I put the general framework together... but then I had no idea how to continue the story. But at some point I had this idea. Watch out! The positive shift in direction is only a hope... that the audience is still harboring. I have to lead them to believe it might still happen, 16:26 in order to really disappoint them when it doesn't. Then I got this idea of using the rewind. 16:42 That has the double effect of again highlighting the filmic nature of what you're seeing and also moving the story forward on the path it would follow in real life. 17:00 You shouldn't have done that, Anna. You can't break the rules. Sorry. You blew it. 17:11 Say good-bye to Georgie. If you asked him why he did all this, he'd say... "Why not? Because it's fun." That's the fundamental ethical question: "Why do you commit evil?" "Why not?" It's a question about whether God exists or not, about the meaning of our existence. Because there is no argument against the argument "Why not?" If someone doesn't believe in certain norms and values, there's no way to convince them otherwise. Where's the remote? Where's the fucking remote control? The film was meant to hurt. It was playing a cynical game with viewers' expectations. I made it very clear to viewers what they were watching. I rubbed their noses in it again and again: "This is a film." They feel grabbed by the scruff of the neck. 18:13 People don't like that. They don't like to be seen through. That was the really provocative aspect. It wasn't the violence. There's more violence in any police drama on TV. It was the underlying attitude. That's why people felt offended. Intellectuals said, "I'm not that stupid. You needn't tell me. I know all that." Of course. We all know. But to know it as you watch is another matter. When Susanne Lothar shoots one of the villains, the audience applauded. To show that very thing was exactly the point too. I only had to provide sufficient reasons for people to go along with blowing someone away. And it really worked. That was another moment I thought, "I got them !" When certain people got so upset about the film, I thought... "Why didn't they just walk out?" 19:15 But I also thought, "The film is for those who deserve it." The people who really wanted to watch did so regardless. But to be outraged afterwards that they stayed even though they found it repugnant - that's a bit hypocritical. Even though this film didn't win at Cannes, that Cannes festival remains for me even today the most exciting and validating screening I've ever experienced. Because all hell broke loose after the film. Pro and con, it was a high-decibel shouting match. I remember later with The Piano Teacher, when there was overwhelming applause and cheering, I was actually disappointed. "I obviously didn't land any direct blows to the heart like I did with Funny Games." With Funny Games, people were foaming at the mouth, some with rage, some with enthusiasm. When you make a film like that that's intended to provoke, 20:18 a reaction like that is enormously satisfying. Because I provoke in order to provoke an insight. And apparently it worked quite well. But, of course, there are people - Since then, the film on video has achieved a kind of cult status... in a way I don't like. Like Clockwork Orange in its day, when Kubrick actually thought of withdrawing the film because it was being consumed as a cult film. And Funny Games, strangely enough - or not strangely at all, when you look at how the media landscape has developed - has become over the years a touchstone film... and that's a double-edged sword. But when it was released, it certainly caused shock waves, 21:19 and at the screening I was really very, very satisfied. You had a dozen, and you're shopping Monday anyway. We just want the eggs. That's all. Can you tell me what's going on? It's sad when you work with friends and then they die. Three of the four leads have died: Susanne Lothar and Ulrich Mühe, as well as Frank Giering, who played Fatty. That was tragic. In my later film The White Ribbon, I wrote the role of the pastor for Ulrich Mühe. I still remember where I was during preparations when the phone rang, with Suse calling to say... "Uli won't be able to do the role. He has advanced cancer." I was thunderstruck. 22:19 He died shortly thereafter. For the cast that was - I'm very happy I found Burghart Klaussner, who was wonderful in the role. Totally different from what I originally had in mind, because Uli was a completely different type. And when we shot The White Ribbon, Suse was in a very fragile state because of that. And only a few years later she too died... or committed suicide. And Frank Giering... who was an absolute beginner back then, had made quite a career for himself He played lots of TV roles. And one day he suddenly died too. He wasn't even 40. That's sort of scary when you make a film with more or less four people who are your friends, and then th ree of them die. 23:22 There's nothing funny about that. 23:31 Most good thrillers... and films like that are made in the States. And I of course thought... that with this film I'd find an audience there. But they quickly realized I'd sent them a Trojan horse, and things didn't work out the way I'd hoped. It led to my being given the opportunity later to remake it with American actors, so I did it all over again. But my ideas about that proved wrong as well. Despite the American actors - presumably a real plus - people still realized it was a Trojan horse, and they never gave the film a chance. They called it "nothing but a shot-for-shot remake." I didn't read a single serious analysis or review. "He made the same film again ." That was it. 24:33 But no one asked why. It was unique, something never done before. No one even thought about that. But what can you do?
