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(c) AJMalouin 2006
(Rating: 2 by Al) (2005—Michael Haneke —Austria/France/Germany/Italy) (1 hr 57. Rated R for brief strong violence.)

The film opens and closes on locked-down exterior shots. In both shots nothing out of the ordinary seems to be happening.

What happens between these two bookend shots, however, changes entirely the way we look at them.

The opening locked-down shot shows the exterior of a building wherein a French couple has an apartment. We watch and watch and watch for several moments, while absolutely nothing happens. Just when we are on the verge of screaming, “All right, ACTION already!!!” we hear the voice-over of a man & woman. “What’s going on?” one asks. “Nothing. That’s all there is,” the other replies.

It turns out that the opening shot is part of a two-hour videotape of the exterior of that couple’s apartment. The videotape has been left on their doorstep. It also turns out to be the first of many tapes the couple will receive from….Somebody. We never find out who that Somebody is.

We keep, however, watching these mysterious tapes, along with the couple.

Soon we don’t know if we are watching the real film, or another videotape within the film. Reality inside this film is hidden from us. We don’t know who’s behind the videotapes. We don’t know how they are doing the taping— or what their ultimate intentions are.

As the tension caused by these constantly arriving tapes builds, the couple falls into estranged bickering. The man suspects that he knows who is sending the tapes. When the police offer no help, the man begins his own investigation. He keeps this investigation hidden from his wife. She discovers it anyway, and he says that the whole thing “doesn’t concern you.”

The estrangement escalates.

Flashbacks to the husband’s childhood slowly reveal the mystery. There are two boys in these flashbacks, one of whom is French and the other who is Algerian. The nature of the relationship between the boys is apparently a microcosm of the relationship between France and Algeria. There is one quick and incredibly violent scene which in these flashbacks which explains and defines the nature of this relationship.

As adults, the discrepancies between the countries are further detailed in the different life-styles of the two now-grown boys.

The full-grown Frenchman (the man receiving the mysterious tapes) has a good job, a beautiful wife (played by Juliette Binoche!), and lives in a fashionable Parisian apartment.

The full-grown Algerian, OTOH, lives alone in a seedy apartment in the seedy part of town.

Eventually the Frenchman goes to visit the Algerian again. Again there is one quick and incredibly violent scene which explains and defines the natures of this relationship.

Both those violent acts are outward manifestations of the underlying attitudes and assumptions that are hidden in the course of everyday life.

At the beginning of the film, we think that nothing is going on, yet there is always something hidden behind what we are looking at. By the end of the film, we know that this is the case. Reality, the *real* reality, is always hidden from the audience.

The closing locked-down shot shows the exterior of the building wherein the French couple’s son attends school. We watch and watch and watch the children coming out of the school but nothing seems to be going on.

We watched the opening lock-down shot with a complete sense of boredom.

We watch the closing lock-down shot, however, with a knots of tension in our heads and stomachs.

That tension starts as a small seed somewhere early in the film. By the closing locked-down shot, that tension is a full-blooming orchid, capable of ensnaring the largest housefly.

We are not even sure if we are watching the real film or just another videotape inside the film.

Just when we have come to expect that Anything could happen at any moment…the closing credits roll.

Brilliant, brilliant film!