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I'm going to start doing some five-minute reviews, in an effort to get this blog moving again. Unfortunately, my thoughts will be cut short. It's a shame, because I'd actually have a lot to praise about this one.

Ever since I saw Cache, Michael Haneke entered my radar as a filmmaker to follow. If you haven't seen that movie, do so now - it's a perfect companion piece to White Ribbon, which is about a small town in the years before WWI. Several townspeople are attacked and no one can figure out who is causing all of the trouble. The young male teacher becomes suspicious of the town's children, although there's a lot left to speculation.

The children aren't the only ones who have their issues in this town, though. The adults all live moral lives and encourage the children to a life of innocence (which is outwardly shown by the white ribbon one father ties on his children), yet many of the adults have their own secrets, the existence of which could easily be the cause of behavior problems with the children.

The way I am describing this movie sounds a lot less serious than it is. This is a slowly paced, reserved movie. The acts that take place are heinous and sad, and it's hard to imagine who would do them. It's sadder still to discover the secrets beneath the town's surface. It's about the end of innocence, for children, for the quiet life, and for the world itself as the first World War looms on the horizon.

It's shot in black and white, quite beautifully, and I love the enigma that Haneke provides for us. My sister and I had an odd audience yet again, full of elderly people who apparently didn't look up the movie before seeing it. They complained about it being boring and long, and at the end, they all turned to each other and questioned what it all meant. For my sister and I, it was a great film, and one of the best of 2009's movies. It contains some of the best scenes I saw all year.