Le Temps du loup

A French woman (Isabelle Huppert) and her two young children struggle for survival shortly after an unidentified apocalypse. This is a very different sort of post-apocalyptic film--it is very minimalist and dramatic. The most fascinating aspect is that whatever happened to the world is never explained or even discussed by the characters. The only thing they know is that uncontaminated water is scarce and personal belongings are very valuable. They are living in the present, fighting for survival. The characters are often devoid of extreme emotion during the crises they face in the film, so the viewer assumes that whatever happened that changed the world must have been graphic and brutal.

Haneke is an exceptional filmmaker and has quite an eye. The combination of lingering camera-work and lack of score create an uneasy tension. Some might argue that the movie is boring because there isn't much action, but I thought it was visually stunning. The movie attempts to be about post-apocalypse social struggle and power--including conflict between different nationalities and genders--but it could have been more successful in doing this. The acting is outstanding (especially by Huppert and the actress that plays her daughter). Even though she gets co-billing, Beatrice Dalle is only in the film for a bit, but she does have a "Betty Blue"-style freak-out. I recommend this to anyone who likes post-apocalypse movies and is interested in seeing a hauntingly realistic one.

My Rating: 7/10

Haneke's nightmare vision of a post-apocalyptic world is darkly atmospheric and beautifully photographed. True, there isn't much of a plot and the pace is slow. The film is primarily a mood piece, but a very good one. Unlike the usual end-of-the-world thriller, the characters aren't facing any ghoulish monsters other than each other. This approach lends a striking realism to the movie.

Some of Haneke's films -- especially "Funny Games" -- are marred by heavy-handed social commentary. Happily, this is not a problem in "Time of the Wolf." One can always read politics into any allegory, but it is quite unnecessary in this film. I neither know nor care whether Haneke had a specific political situation in mind; what matters is that the resulting movie stands on its own as an artistic achievement.

8/10. Recommended for fans of grim, moody films.

As a grand fan of Haneke, I went to this film without looking to the critiques. I know that his "German rigidity" can be incomprehensible for the Anglo-Saxon and French point of view. But after one hour, I quited the film, that is one of the worst screenplays that I have ever seen, Haneke's abstraction that works very good in "Die Klavierspielerin" does not work at all in this film. Nearly all of the elements of the story has no context. The plot is more than abstract or far from comprehension, it does not exist. I think I understood what was he trying to do, but I should admit that it is a shame for such a great director. Haneke should have written this screenplay with an amnesia for the basic rules of dramatic construction. There are NOT any explanation of the events in the film. But even Bunuel or Lynch have to explain the events in their films. And they do so, that's why they are great directors. So did Haneke. But how can we explain the passage between the Parisian bourgeoisie and the third world? Haneke's "I do it, and it's OK" is just makes his film unbelievably forced to disturb the public. Haneke used to not to force the spectators to disturb them. That was natural, let's say existential in his films. Please see again "The Seventh Continent", "Benny's Video" or "71 pieces of a hazardous chronology". Those are masterpieces of the contemporary cinema. But "Les temps du loup" is just a complete failure. The fascination of the admirers of this film are astonishing to me. I highly recommend to compare to "German Haneke" with the "French" one. I wish to see a Heneke coming back to his roots in Vienna.

It is funny to me how a lot of people react to this movie. It seems they feel that this movie shows us decadent westerners what living in more impoverished and exploited parts of the globe is like. Well, it's a very fine film, but that certainly not what it's about. To reduce every artistic expression to world affairs is a rather shameless exposition of western self-guilt and political correctness. Now, there is enough to be ashamed about, but why should that always be connected to artistic expressions of western artists. Please stop politicizing everything. Le Temps du Loup is not about the third world, anyone who thinks that third world countries look any thing like what is happening in Haneke's film is out of his/her mind. News flash, people in the third world actually life daily, relatively stable lives, notwithstanding rampant poverty and high levels of violence and unsafety. What we see in Le Temps du Loup is what Hobbes means by "State of Nature", a lawless, non-dominated society. What Haneke shows in minute detail (and in that lies his greatest accomplishment) is that human connection, trust and intimacy is always in some senses based on dominating practices that stabilize the uncertainties and risks of interacting and competing with others in a shared social environment. The ambiguous status of the Koslowski character is a case in point, are his actions justifiable or is he just an exploitative oppressor? Same for the horse, but now in a more confronting way, because the line between fact and fiction is crossed. So Temps du Loup is an analysis of human co-habitation of any human society. Art is not political, what we do with it is.

Just saw TIME OF THE WOLF in New York City, and it is a complete pleasure. A very subtle film about individual and mass psychology after an unnamed cataclysm.

Also a cautionary tale about having plenty of fresh batteries, lighters, and a good knife, or knives, on hand (you never know when you're going to have to skin your own dinner; hey, call me extreme when that unnamed cataclysm comes around).

An added bonus: no digital effects (although I think they got lucky with fog one day, and made a beautiful scene with it), no manic editing as a substitute for storytelling, no facile heroics, no predictable deus ex machina...it will cleanse the visual palette. It stars Isabelle Huppert, but she is so naturalistic you forget she's Isabelle Huppert.

For an altogether different, but equally pleasurable, although more theatrical, yet completely underrated take on the unnamed cataclysm bit, see

A BOY AND HIS DOG. A dream of a movie.