Blackwell Reference Online

Michael Haneke is one of the most important directors to have emerged on the global cinema scene in the past fifteen years. After gaining international attention in the 1990s with a string of iconoclastic films that analyze the dysfunctional state of Western society, Haneke has since established himself as one of art cinema's most creative, controversial, and eloquent social commentators.

The Companion to Michael Haneke is the definitive collection of newly-commissioned works exploring Haneke's work in its entirety—from his early work in television and theatre, prodigious cinematic output, through to his 2009 triumph at Cannes. The work brings together essays by some of the foremost scholars in film studies, as well as exclusive interviews with the director himself. Considering the themes that have formed the nucleus of Haneke's work–pornography, alienation, citizenship, colonialism, the fate of European cinema, Hollywood, and the gaze of surveillance, the Companion offers a critical examination of Haneke's oeuvre—from La Pianiste, Time of the Wolf, Three Paths to the Lake, Caché and Palme d'Or winner, The White Ribbon. Designed for scholars and students of film studies, Germanists, and today's movie lovers, the Companion to Michael Haneke showcases this enigmatic and complicated director with unprecedented depth and breadth.