Michael Haneke, bless his nihilistic heart, can always be counted on to be the antidote to Hollywood pap like the sappy “Wonder.” His “family films” offer zero warmth, little compassion and suicidal characters who’ve had it with phoniness and insincerity. So, why should we expect anything less from his latest dive into disappointment and despair, the ironically titled “Happy End”?
Dreamers and optimists are advised to stay at least 1,000 feet away to ensure you’re not within listening distance of such Haneke amusements as attempted murder, serial adultery, spineless children and an adorable grandfather itching to get his arthritic hands on a weapon or pills so he can do himself in. By contrast, realists will discover a kindred spirit in Haneke’s unrelenting pessimism. He feels your pain and turns it into entertainment predicated on the darkest of black comedy.
It all begins innocently with 12-year-old Eve (a cunning Fantine Harduin), the youngest – if you don’t count her infant half-brother – of the wealthy but clueless Laurent family of Calais, France. The sweet-faced little child of divorce hates her mother so much she slips the woman who bore her an antidepressant cocktail that lands Mom in the hospital. So, it’s off to Dad’s to live, if you want to call that living. Her old man, Thomas (Mathieu Kassovitz), an accomplished surgeon with a thing for the ladies, is already on his second marriage and has prospects for a third, as evidenced by the sexually graphic emails we watch him type out and send to a beautiful cellist named Actrice (Loubna Abidar).
Joining Eve and Thomas in their luxurious villa are: Thomas’ sister, Anne (Haneke regular Isabelle Huppert, superb), the owner of a large construction company; her weakling son, Pierre (weaselly Franz Rogowski), who she’s struggling to groom to take over the business; Thomas’ latest wife, Anais (Laura Verlinden); their baby; and the aforementioned suicidal grandpa, Georges (Haneke’s “Amour” star Jean-Louis Trintignant). There you have it, just one big, miserable family that spends its days sniping, arguing and pointing fingers. The only sane folks in the house are their two Moroccan-born servants who can only look on and shake their heads.
The domestics aren’t the only immigrants lurking around this bleak dysfunction junction. We also spy many other dark faces, presumably residents of the nearby refugee camp in Calais. The point being that the petty problems of the bourgeois Laurent clan are nothing compared to what migrants have gone through in their treacherous journeys in search of asylum. Not that the self-involved Laurents would notice.
While Haneke’s intent is admirable, it’s not terribly enlightening, nor does he proffer any solutions to Europe’s massive immigrant issues. What Haneke does give us – as both the writer and the film’s director – is a multigenerational ensemble of terrific actors inflating an otherwise airless enterprise highly susceptible to scrutiny. No character, accept the hopelessly naive Anais, is what you’d call likeable. But they are interesting, and in the case of Harduin’s budding murderer, fascinating, particularly in her big scene opposite Trintignant, who tells the preteen a shocking story from his past aimed at getting the kid to open up, but also furthers our suspicions that Gramps is no big believer in the sanctity of life.
It’s good stuff, as is the squirm-inducing scene when Eve confronts her philandering Pops about his sexual indiscretions. But too often those assets are countered by some deadly dull stretches where Haneke allows his cinematographer, Christian Berger, to linger on certain shots for interminable lengths, such as the three-minute segment in which we watch Georges silently rolling his wheelchair down a sidewalk without explanation or context. It’s scenes like that, and another long, long shot of Eve packing her suitcase, that push you away more than pull you in. The film is funny, though, in a sick sort of way. But given that it’s been five years since Haneke’s last film, the Oscar-winning “Amour,” it’s not ridiculous to expect something a bit more substantive than what “Happy End” offers. Yes, it deals in death and human destruction but that shouldn’t preclude its soul from ascending to a better place.
Movie reviewHAPPY END(R for some sexual material and language.) Cast includes Isabelle Huppert, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Fantine Harduin, Mathieu Kassovitz and Toby Jones. Grade: B-