The world
that is known
Michael Haneke interviewed
Haneke's films document the failures of modern society on a variety of levels. Christopher Sharrett talks to the director about his ongoing critique of Western civilisation.
Long night's
journey into day
Michael Haneke's Le Temps du loup (The Time of the Wolf, 2003)
In his latest film, Haneke turns his hand to the revived genre of the disaster movie. As Adam Bingham explains, the director subverts our expectations to create what is possibly the darkest film of 2003.
The horror of
the middle class
Michael Haneke's La Pianiste
(The Piano Teacher, 2001)
Like many a horror film, La Pianiste shows that the most unsettling plots are those where monsters arise from everyday middle-class life. Christopher Sharrett looks at how Haneke portrays bourgeois sexuality in its most scary form.
"What are you looking at and why?"
Michael Haneke's
Funny Games (1997)
In this Brechtian-influenced analysis of Michael Haneke's most controversial film, Tarja Laine looks at how the director "manages to depict violence not as entertainment or even as an innate part of life, but as inconsolable."
Effects of the real
Michael Haneke's
Benny's Video (1992)
Benny's Video shows the emotional detachment and unwillingness to psychologize seen in the films of Robert Bresson. Brigitte Peucker looks at how this postmodern bourgeois melodrama plays with representations of reality to bring us closer to what is real.
Life, or
something like it
Michael Haneke's
Der siebente Kontinent
(The Seventh Continent, 1989)
Haneke's debut, a calm depiction of a Viennese family who form a suicide pact, is not easy viewing, but, as Adam Bingham argues, the film is optimistic in its refusal to console its audience.
From the archive
