Politics of Sequence in Code Unknown (2000, Michael Haneke)

Even before the recent events that occurred in Charlottesville, a certain scene from Michael Haneke’s 2000 film, Code Unknown (Code Inconnu), had been repeatedly playing on a loop in my mind’s eye.  I quietly admitted to myself recently that the scene in question is without a doubt the most telling and poignant dramatic escalation I have seen in twenty-first-century cinema and it seems to show … Continue reading Politics of Sequence in Code Unknown (2000, Michael Haneke)

Repetition, Adorno and 71 Fragments Of A Chronology Of Chance (Haneke).

Much has been written about the stark comparisons between the cinema of Michael Haneke and the culture theories of the Frankfurt School of philosophy.  In the 2010 book, A Companion To Michael Haneke, Roy Grundmann devotes a whole essay in the volume to Theodor Adorno and the “aesthetic fragmentation” of several of Haneke’s films whilst various articles and essays spend time drawing comparisons to Haneke’s … Continue reading Repetition, Adorno and 71 Fragments Of A Chronology Of Chance (Haneke).

The Seventh Continent (Michael Haneke) and the Freudian Death Drive – Part 1.

Introduction Michael Haneke’s debut feature set the tone for the majority of his interests that would be explored over the next few decades.  The Seventh Continent (1989), though part of the Glaciation Trilogy, stands on its own for questioning a very specific and brutal form of philosophy; that of Freud’s Death Drive principles.  Though Haneke would address philosophical issues in a lot of his films (this … Continue reading The Seventh Continent (Michael Haneke) and the Freudian Death Drive – Part 1.

Salò (1975) and the Potential for an Adornian Film (Pier Paolo Pasolini).

Reading through some of the writing of Frankfurt school philosopher, Theodor Adorno, it becomes extremely clear that mass culture is what he believes to be the fault of many of the world’s problems as well as symptom of them too; a false enlightenment perhaps, which is the product of simply being unable to accept a world after the end of the Second World War and, … Continue reading Salò (1975) and the Potential for an Adornian Film (Pier Paolo Pasolini).