A masterpiece most will not understand

Rating: 8/10 (4 August 2009)

Just finished watching this at Melbourne International Film Festival 2009 with the girlfriend..She rated it a 2 out of 5, I gave it a out of 5..Both of us also saw a fantastic documentary called The Cove on the weekend which we both rated 5 out of 5..Just goes to show that anything that we emotionally and visually connect with is going to inherently going to rate better..
The White Ribbon deals with our hypocritical society and really exposes how little we have progressed..Sins are committed by elders in the name of religion or parenting and the children bear the scars..Are we any better today in our behaviour? I think not..Haneke doesn't bother ramming it down our throats..Indeed, the black and white cinematography is exquisite and a major reason I felt why we couldn't connect with on a emotional scale..Perhaps Haneke meant that to be so?
None of the characters overshadow each other and things move at a deliberate pace..Things unfold slowly so we may understand what is happening here..Elders committing atrocities, going unpunished for their behaviour, but the sins are being punished by crimes against the children, and in an interesting turn of events, questions are raised by the central character, The Teacher, that the crimes may indeed be the handiwork of the children themselves, punishing the parents for their repulsive behaviour...
As per usual, nothing is laid out on a platter, not even the ending..remember Hidden(Cache)? A lot of quizzical looks around, muted applause and a lot of ppl like my girlfriend will forget about it by tomorrow..But as a lesson on what animals and monsters we hide and ignore behind the safe curtain of society's rules of hypocrisy, this is a monumental expose by Michael Haneke..
Brilliant, thought-provoking, sublime cinematography and a movie-maker self-assured to let the movie slowly unfold and at the top of his game, yet another important addition to his existing body of work.. **** out of *****