I don't usually have an opinion on movies I haven't seen, but I did see the trailer and knew halfway through that this was one I was going to pass on. The reviewer's description makes me glad I did. And I say that as someone who enjoyed such movies, if squimishly, as Sweeny Todd, No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, Schindler's List, In Cold Blood (the original), and Pulp Fiction. I've been trying to decide what the difference is. I think, in those movies, that the focus was not in the complete spiritual and physical destruction of the characters. They are dark, violent, and bloody, but the the overall tone did not strike me as nihilistic as Funny Games is described.

Like some of the other reviewers here, I love a good horror movie, but for the suspense, rather than gore. The Ring (and the Japanese original) scared me to death, and I don't remember any blood in that one, just water and slime and a brief film that contained nothing but objects, yet was so menacing I was afraid I was going to be stalked having seen it. Ghost stories, like The Others, are more my speed, though.

Movies I've refused to see? Saw (1-infinity), Hostel (ibid), or The Passion of the Christ. In our household we call these "blood porn."
There is enough violence and horror in the world. I don't need it pumped into my arm by fictional IV.

Violence for its own sake, as the main focus of the entertainment and sole purpose of the story, for me falls under the Buddhist category of "wrong consumption." Like bad food or drugs, these movies are toxic without any redeeming value. I'm disturbed, in a country where school shootings are becoming routine, that franchises like Saw are so popular.

I saw the movie, and really don't remember it at all. There was such a big deal made of it that I felt compelled to watch it, and was left completely unmoved. I don't remember it being especially impressed with it's violence, and I already knew the story.

Natural Born Killers, though, that was violence-porn at it's best (or, worste).

Yeah, I thought the trailer made the movie seem godawful too, and the review has only further confirmed this impression.

I agree that genuine horror is much scarier when it's less in-your-face. What you can't see is always scarier than what you can see, if that makes any sense. I know I'm tired of all of these violent, gorey, nihilistic torture films that have been coming out recently.

I wonder about the school shooting thing too. I work at an elementary school and most of the kids regularly watch these types of movies. I had a bunch of 7-year old's excitedly tell me the entire plot of Saw. Who in the hell lets their 7-year old watch Saw? Unfortunately it seems like a lot of people do. And there will probably be a bunch of morons that will let their kids watch 'Funny Games' too. You have to wonder how this affects kids in the long run.

Thank you for this review and all the supporting comments. "Blood Porn" is a lovely way to describe these films, and I too am shocked that so many people flock to these movies for a horrific adrenaline rush. Apparently TV news and the front page of any newspaper isn't enough? I appreciate a good scary movie and suspenseful films never tire... when they're well done. It seems to me that Funny Games and other films like Saw and Hostel don't care as much about suspense as they do about shock value. Unfortunately shock exploitation films are not a new phenomenon: see Thomas Edison's Electrocuting an Elephant, 1903. But thank you, Dana Stevens, for pointing out the aesthetic value and the film's experimentative quality. This is significant, even if most of us will never have the stomach to watch it.

Seven year olds watched "Saw"???? How is that any different than giving them alcohol or pot? Jeeze, I felt guilty taking my kids to see Jurassic Park when they were in fourth and sixth grade, respectively.

SpectatorAtTheScene:

Seven year olds watched "Saw"???? How is that any different than giving them alcohol or pot? Jeeze, I felt guilty taking my kids to see Jurassic Park when they were in fourth and sixth grade, respectively.

These films don't seem to scare them very much.

Oh, these kids anymore watch everything. I have to admit it shocked me at first but after awhile you just get used to it. I guess you can say at least none of it seems to traumatize them very much; they'll be chirping happily away about the most gorey, blood drenched films, stuff that I couldn't even stomach to watch, and they don't seem to find any of it too scary or traumatizing. They'll talk about Saw the same way they talk about Disney movies.

The funny thing is when parents tell me to my face that they are so very very careful about little Johnny's tv viewing, and they always monitor the shows he watches, and then the very next day little Johnny is talking about how him and Mommy and Daddy were all watching Resident Evil together. That happens WAY too often.