Georges and Anne are an octogenarian couple. They are cultivated, retired music teachers. Their daughter, also a musician, lives in Britain with her family. One day, Anne has a stroke, and the couple's bond of love is severely tested.
Strange events happen in a small village in the north of Germany during the years before World War I, which seem to be ritual punishment. Who is responsible?
Director:
Michael Haneke
Stars:
Christian Friedel,
Ernst Jacobi,
Leonie Benesch
Two violent young men take a mother, father, and son hostage in their vacation cabin and force them to play sadistic "games" with one another for their own amusement.
A young man harasses a homeless woman, another man protests, the police arrest both and the woman has to leave the country. What were their various story-lines leading up to this event?
Director:
Michael Haneke
Stars:
Juliette Binoche,
Thierry Neuvic,
Josef Bierbichler
When Anna and her family arrive at their holiday home, they find it occupied by strangers. This confrontation is just the beginning of a painful learning process.
Director:
Michael Haneke
Stars:
Isabelle Huppert,
Anaïs Demoustier,
Béatrice Dalle
A European family who plan on escaping to Australia, seem caught up in their daily routine, only troubled by minor incidents. However, behind their apparent calm and repetitive existence, they are actually planning something sinister.
Anna, a young novitiate nun in 1960s Poland, is on the verge of taking her vows when she discovers a dark family secret dating back to the years of the German occupation.
A 14-year-old video enthusiast is so caught up in film fantasy that he can no longer relate to the real world, to such an extent that he commits murder and records an on-camera confession for his parents.
Georges and Anne are a couple of retired music teachers enjoying life in their eighties. However, Anne suddenly has a stroke at breakfast and their lives are never the same. That incident begins Anne's harrowingly steep physical and mental decline as Georges attempts to care for her at home as she wishes. Even as the fruits of their lives and career remain bright, the couple's hopes for some dignity prove a dispiriting struggle even as their daughter enters the conflict. In the end, George, with his love fighting against his own weariness and diminished future on top of Anne's, is driven to make some critical decisions for them both.Written by
Kenneth Chisholm (kchishol@rogers.com)
This is the most optimistic film about death that I have ever seen.My feeling when it ended was "I don't feel afraid to grow old and die". The lack of sentimentality was such a relief, not that I was expecting a drama. No highs and lows, just a straight line, like death. But I never felt death surrounding the film. Rather, I felt that I was watching the early years of the couple, though they never appear in the film. Like I knew their whole life. There are not words for the two actors. I saw my parents in them,although they are completely different. And I saw myself in them. I was so touched by this film, in a unique, inexplicable way. I fell in love with the inevitability. I fell in love with growing old. And die. It made me feel safe somehow. The only drama I experienced through this film was "will I find true love?".
5 of 5 people found this review helpful.
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This is the most optimistic film about death that I have ever seen.My feeling when it ended was "I don't feel afraid to grow old and die". The lack of sentimentality was such a relief, not that I was expecting a drama. No highs and lows, just a straight line, like death. But I never felt death surrounding the film. Rather, I felt that I was watching the early years of the couple, though they never appear in the film. Like I knew their whole life. There are not words for the two actors. I saw my parents in them,although they are completely different. And I saw myself in them. I was so touched by this film, in a unique, inexplicable way. I fell in love with the inevitability. I fell in love with growing old. And die. It made me feel safe somehow. The only drama I experienced through this film was "will I find true love?".