You only need to get one gander at
the opening credits of Caché (Hidden), Michael Haneke’s latest film, to know that the Austrian
auteur will not be making things easy for you. Using the tiniest letters,
Haneke jams the names of his cast, crew, and financiers into one frame over a
street scene that seems incredibly boring… and then it starts to rewind.
What we’re watching — along with
Anne (Juliette Binoche, Chocolat) and
Georges (Daniel Auteuil, the hardest-working man in France)
— is videotape that has been left on their doorstep by their stalker. Someone
has been filming the exterior of the Laurents’ Paris
home, and while the tape isn’t overtly menacing, Anne and Georges are
understandably unnerved. You may find yourself feeling the same way, as that
opening shot will cause you to question the origins of nearly every subsequent
one.
The surprisingly suspenseful Caché watches as Anne and Georges begin
to unravel after receiving more surveillance tapes, now wrapped in crude
drawings featuring a cheery crimson smear. A video of Georges’ childhood home
leads him to believe someone from his past may be seeking revenge on him, and
Georges’ odd reluctance to share his theories with Anne drives a further wedge
between them.
The police won’t help, so Georges
takes matters into his own hands, confronting his suspected stalker in a series
of increasingly puzzling exchanges that culminate in a scene that is vintage
Haneke. (Note to self: Apologize to neighbors for screaming.)
1997’s Funny Games, an unabashedly nasty romp about a family terrorized by
a couple of teen sadists, was Haneke’s breakout in the international cinema
game, and since then he has continued to challenge moviegoers worldwide with
films, like 2001’s award-winning The
Piano Teacher, that defy the conventional notions of entertainment. Haneke,
who won Best Director at Cannes for Caché,
enlists French film royalty for the main roles here, and both Binoche and
Auteuil are dependably dazzling — especially Binoche, who registers Anne’s
growing mistrust of her husband all over her painfully expressive face.
Haneke ends Caché with another stagnant shot, but don’t think that there isn’t
anything going on in this busy little scene, and don’t let Haneke direct your
eyes away from what he really wants you to see. If you’re vigilant, all your
questions will be answered.
Sorry; did I say “answered”? I meant
compounded.
The
release of The White Countess marks the end of an era. Throughout a romantic and professional partnership
stretching over 40 years producer Ismail Merchant and director James Ivory
arguably defined the term “arthouse film,” but Merchant’s death last May leaves
The White Countess as the final
Merchant Ivory production.
To be honest, their output in the
21st century (i.e., 2001’s abysmal The
Golden Bowl and 2003’s Le Divorce)
has not achieved the almost impossibly high standards they set for themselves
with classics like A Room with a View,
Howards End, and The Remains of the Day. And while the uneven The White Countess is also unable to reach those lofty heights,
Merchant Ivory’s last film is an appropriately lovely finale to a landmark
collaboration.
The original screenplay by novelist
Kazuo Ishiguro sets the film in 1930s Shanghai,
where a family of Russian nobles have fled. Sofia (Natasha Richardson) is the
breadwinner, earning her wages consorting with men. Her family despises her for
this, but they can’t spend her money fast enough.
Sofia
comes to the aid of a blind American diplomat named Jackson (Ralph Fiennes) one
evening and makes enough of an impression on him that he seeks her out as the
centerpiece for his nightclub, The White Countess. Political upheaval forces
the two of them to confront unacknowledged feelings as Shanghai
begins to fall to the Japanese.
The
White Countess‘s cast is the stuff of dreams. Fiennes, as always, is
perfect, and the well-cast Richardson
(I’m usually not a big fan of hers) brings the Redgrave family count up to
three: Aunt Lynn plays the manipulative Olga, and mother Vanessa also has a
small part as the somewhat dotty Sara. But the repressed emotions Merchant
Ivory aficionados have come to expect are a little too buried here, with
Richardson and Fiennes generating more indifference than heat.
Fortunately, the movie itself is
stunning, having been shot by Wong Kar-wai’s right-hand man, Christopher Doyle.
No one captures Asia quite as beautifully as the
Australian cinematographer does, and he helps make Merchant Ivory’s flawed swan
song a memorable one.
Caché (R), directed by Michael
Haneke, opens Friday, February 17, at Little Theatres | The White Countess (PG-13), directed by James Ivory, is playing at Pittsford Cinema.
This article appears in Feb 15-21, 2006.
