Michael’s Videos

There is a moment in Michael Haneke’s latest film, Amour, in which the wife, whose name – as in every Haneke film – is Anne, begins to utter a single word, “mal”, over and over again. Seeing the evident distress this causes on the face of Anne’s husband, whose name – as in every Haneke film – is Georges, the nurse comfortingly says, “Don’t take it to heart. They usually say something.” Implying: it’s normal, don’t think about it. “She could just as easily be saying ‘mum’.”

In the English subtitled version of Amour, “mal” is transcribed as “hurts” and given the situation – an elderly women, paralysed and helpless after a series of strokes – this seems the logical, sensible choice of translation. But if, as the nurse implies, Anne’s choice of word (though not, of course, Haneke’s) is as good as arbitrary, we might just as well consider the other common meaning of this French word: “evil”.

What do we think of when we consider the question of evil in relation to the films of Michael Haneke? I suspect that for most people familiar with his oeuvre, one of the first things that will come to mind is the face of Arno Frisch, turning to the camera with a smile and a wink in 1997’s original Funny Games. This is a wink which, like Shakespeare’s Iago, invites you to share in its schemes and, in so doing, implicates you as accessory; an evil which charms and immediately makes you feel guilty for being so charmed.

Read the full article on Michael Haneke and the Banality of Evil at The Quietus.

11/26/12 at 10:02am