Showing Films Worth Seeing...
White Ribbon (15)
This is a tour-de-force, a film which confirms Haneke as the European director. Set in the North German plain in a rural community just before the Great War, the film sits on various different levels. It could be just a thriller, a who-dunnit. It could be a critique of a society in flux - on the road from feudalism to modernity. It could be a psychological portrait of the Germans, because as the narrator says: what we witness 'may explain what came later'. But above all it is a riveting and chilling piece of film-making. A film where you suddenly realise you have inadvertently destroyed the seat covers with the tension.
Director: Michael Haneke
Cast: Christian Friedel, Leonie Benesch, Ulrich Tukur, Ursini Lardi, Burghart Klaussner, Michael Kranz
Germany/Austria/Italy/France, 144 mins, Subtitles
