Not so Funny Games

Michael Haneke has remade his own acclaimed 1997 Austrian thriller Funny Games for the U.S. audience and we get our first look at the movie today thanks to MSN via Coming Soon. The trailer for the remake stars off as a shot by shot rehash of his earlier film but then almost goes into a humorous/disturbing sequence of flash images and music which just doesn't what we seen on screen at all. But of course that is the point I guess. The movie is about two psychotic young men played by Michael Pitt and Brady Corbet who take a couple (Naomi Watts & Tim Roth) and their son (Devon Gearhart) as hostage in their own home. I've uploaded the trailers for both of Haneke versions. His trailer for the remake obviously shows us a lot more of what's going in the picture but I find it doesn't work as well as the previous. It's played extremely tongue in cheek and is maybe a little unintentionally funny but the trailer for the original seems to work really well. It shows less, and comes off a lot more sinister. It's going to be interesting to compare the two movies once the remake has opened to see just what Haneke has changed for the U.S. audience. I have a feeling this is set to bomb big time and from this trailer, this movie looks like a hard sell. Remake first which opens in a limted February release...

The 1997 original. Prepare for some Deja Vu.