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The apparent “brilliance” of
Michael Haneke has always confounded me to frustrating degrees. Of course I want to fit in with my peers and like his movies, and there is fascinating subject matter in his films, but when three of his alleged masterworks – The Piano Teacher, Cache, and Amour – leave
me with the same chasmal dissatisfaction, I think it’s fair at this point to
say that I just don’t get Haneke. His latest film, Happy End, continues this trend of purgatorial slog.
Happy End does initially displays some promise. An underlying
theme, I think, is how alienation is further perpetuated by technology and
social media. Take, for instance, the opening sequence: from the POV of a phone
camera, we watch a woman’s morning trip to the bathroom. A series of text
messages pinpoint the woman’s actions, which she inadvertently obeys. Cut to
the next scene – a simple CCTV screen of a construction yard that lingers on
for minutes, so long that we almost don’t notice a collapse when it occurs.
The focus of Happy End is centered on the Laurents,
an upper class family. They are embarrassingly empty. When they sit down for
dinner, initiating conversation is like pulling teeth. When somebody does
attempt to get some sort of dialogue started – such as the cliché “How was your
day?” inquiry – it is initiated in the most patronizing manner possible. The
trouble that clouds above the family is quickly unveiled – the depressive
Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) is slipping into dementia; Anne’s (Isabelle
Hupert) construction business comes under scrutiny after a serious on-site
incident; Thomas (Matthieu Kassovitz) is having an affair (unveiled by online
chats); children Eve and Pierre (Fantine Harduin and Franz Rogowski,
respectively) are disenfranchised from the emptiness of their family life.
I find stories of social
dysfunction and alienation fascinating – Michelangelo Antonioni deals with this
material almost exclusively, and he is perhaps my favorite filmmaker (and is a
palpable influence on Haneke). You know, speaking of Antonioni, how ironic that
many of the gripes I have with Haneke are identical to the gripes that
Antonioni’s critics have. I won’t be surprised if I’m blasted as
self-contradictory. Where does Happy End fail
for me, especially considering how many other films of this subject matter
succeed?
Artsy filmmakers (I don’t mean
to sound patronizing with this label) tend to be very adamant about their
movies shutting up, per se, and letting the weight scenarios speak for
themselves without using dialogue. I’m perfectly okay with these kinds of
techniques, but there must be some sort of substance present. If I may go back
to Antonioni as an example, while his characters wander about in silence,
masterful shot composition and use of location give us an idea of what it must
feel like to be those characters. Perhaps a wide-angle shot inside an
echo-filled confined space will say something about the loneliness within the
character.
No such substance is present
in Happy End. As typical with Haneke,
it seems like he is so concerned with letting the silence say everything, per
se, that he forgot to put substance in there. Characters possess little to no
personality, there is no interesting cinematography or shot composition, and
this results in a film that feels really sterile. And when something of
significance does happen – such as
when a character attempts suicide by way of car crash – there is nothing profound
or poignant, thus the movie comes off as obscure for the sake of obscurity, and
kind of pretentious.
I keep reading about how Happy End is trying to say something about
the refugee crisis in Europe all because of a brief moment in the film’s finale.
There is nothing to comment on because of just how brief this moment is, and I
only scoff at the film’s imposition of self-importance.
If there is any substance
whatsoever in Happy End, it lies within
the character in Eve. She has been taken in by her father, Thomas, after her
blood mother’s (and Thomas’s first wife) admittance into the hospital after an
overdose of sedatives – I will not spoil anything, but this was not a suicide
attempt. Eve is a disturbed and depressed young girl. There is no connection
between her and her frivolous family, and she knows there is no connection. On
one hand, pitying Eve is rather difficult at times (you’ll see why), but on the
other hand; to know you are not loved by the people who are supposed to love
you unconditionally…I cannot think of a more emotionally painful knowledge for
a child to possess.
Unfortunately, this one
element of substance is shoved to the wayside in favor of Haneke’s trademark
plodding sterility and arbitrary obscurity – all of which feels like it
cultivates into absolutely nothing.
All of this said, I do want to
emphasize that I am not the right guy to turn to for opinions on Haneke. He’s
never done it for me, and as far as I know, he probably never will. I admit
that I am also too confounded by his movies to properly articulate my opinions.
What I do know is that his movies have never left me satisfied in any way, and Happy End is no exception. All I can
offer you is my opinion, and there it is. I must say, though, that venting about Haneke felt rather good.
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