MovieChat Forums > Import Export (2007) Discussion > Its not a comedy, folks....

Its not a comedy, folks....

posted 16 years ago by diodevox
18 replies | jump to latest

Just saw this film last night at the "Film Comment" series in NYC... A sad and amazing film. This film has been described as "shocking", but what was truly shocking was the audience reaction to this film... there was laughter, giggling and mocking guffaws at the most inappropriate scenes. I mean this was playing to what I would think was a gathering of "sophisticated" film viewers, not a bunch of college kids looking for a cheap laugh. Also what I found disturbing was the laughter seemed directed at the characters themselves, as if Siedl was trying to make a joke about their "misery". Really appalling...

[–] lilfilm 16 years ago

I was at the same screening. Some of the laughter was justified. Some of it was just plain wrong. Sometimes laughter is stemmed from uncomfortability. And some laughter also comes from identifying with truth. For example, there were three Austrian women sitting next to me who were laughing hysterically when Pauli (the security guard) is accosted. And I can understand that. The gang's actions were amusing because of the drunken absurdity.

Then there were those in the audience laughing at the conditions and poverty in the Ukraine. I didn't understand that myself.

[–] 16 years ago

[deleted]

[–] filterite 16 years ago

It's all down to reactions. Some people laugh because what they are watching unnerves them and laughter is the best defence allegedly. There were some scenes I found humourous but there were scenes that nearly had me in tears and in one scene, had my hands over my eyes because I couldn't watch how the step-father completely degrades a girl who hardly understands what he is saying.

[–] roell29 16 years ago

Schadenfreude - malicious pleasure taken from observing the misery of another.

[–] 16 years ago

[deleted]

[–] PTET 15 years ago

With much of the film, if you didn't laugh you'd cry.

Some of the "sex" scenes were fairly comic. Disturbing? Hell yeah. Erotic? Hell no. Seidl's joke is on the morons who think it's acceptable to treat women as worthless objects.

And no offence, diodevox, but are you to be the arbiter of what people are allowed to laugh at?

PTET
--
http://ptet.blogspot.com/

[–] burn on 14 years ago

Dear PTET,

I don't think diodevox was trying to present him/herself as an arbiter of anything. Like everyone else who posts on the imdb message boards, he/she is merely stating an opinion.

Anyway, if I understand what diodevox was trying to convey: in a New York City cinema a group of presumably middle class leftish sophisticates were laughing their merry way through a film depicting poverty, exploitation and pitiful mental illness which is largely in documentary form (those poor old crazy people in the institution didn't seem like actors to me, it was quite real).

Since it is my belief that while Import Export contains flashes of black humour it is clearly not inteaded as a for-the-masses reality freakshow, or a broad gross-out comedy; if the audience treated it as either of those things I would probably have felt a little squemish in there too.

[–] PTET 14 years ago

Good point well made :)

[–] GlorielTheGlorious 13 years ago

Mature exchange of views and ideas is so rarely seen on imdb boards, I feel compelled to give you guys a standing ovation.

'Sooner or later... you really wear that suit'

[–] haewatein 15 years ago

This is one of the most depressing films ever made, how could any heartless bastard laugh at that?
Which monkey doesn't get the message of this film? I mean even if you're not Austrian!

_
SEUL CONTRE TOUS
www.myspace.com/anzycpethian
www.pbase.com/anzycpethian

[–] jon-malmqvist 15 years ago

Lots of Michael Bay fans on this forum perhaps?

[–] raul_7 15 years ago

there is no wrong doing in laughing, it's just ones way of expressing how they feel of what occurs in the film and as a previous poster said (as well as the absurdity argument), it could be due to a number of reasons. You're just as bad, if not worse for taking a film and generalising 'should see' a film, broaden your horizons a little...

[–] saxaz24 14 years ago

you're right. you should never be surprised of peoples stupidity, and you should never underestimate the limits of it.

[–] Krustallos 14 years ago

Can't comment either way on the screening the OP attended, but I would expect an audience to laugh at quite a bit of this film because quite a bit of it is intended to be funny. Albeit in a dark way as a previous poster mentioned. An example would be where Olga has to learn sexually explicit phrases in German in order to work for the internet sex company - even the character was laughing at this. Also where she is dancing with the old man, and many other scenes.

The framing itself was pretty droll in a number of places, starting from the opening shot where a man is repeatedly trying to start a motorbike.

I used to want to change the world. Now I just want to leave the room with a little dignity.

[–] mattjasb37 13 years ago

everything is subjective at best! i just saw the movie, and in my opinion it is not Not a comedy either. a lot of it was funny to me, the main character woman, when she was a nanny for the kids, when the kis wanted his cell phone, when she worked a sa cleaning person at this club for wrinkly lazy people, all those lazy people were funny to me, they said so many abusrd things poetically, and also this movie is not in a language i understand, i saw it with subtitles, so i think things get lost in translation (someone told me that) so pardon me for finding things a certain way just based on the subtitled translation of what the people in the film were saying. but i liked the main characters, i found them to be cool, nice people.

[–] ScottCummings1977 12 years ago

This is a very immature understanding of both the film and of human psychology. Not just the OP but several of the replies, implying people are "stupid" for laughing.

It is certainly meant to be bleak and blackly humorous and several parts are meant to be laugh-out-loud funny. Like when he brings his new dog to his girlfriend's apartment. Like when the elderly people are made up as clowns. Like when the guy on the computer keeps saying over and over: "in the ass. put the finger in the ass.

A film can be "sophisticated" and still be funny. Bela Tarr is known for his mischevious sense of humor. Seidl and Tarr are very different filmmakers but they attract a similar crowd, including young people who believe themselves to be uber sophisto.

I recently went to see Satantango. During the screening multiple people laughed and someone said "It's not funny." Later I heard some younger people complaining about exactly what you're mentioning here. Laughter, giggling at inappropriate scenes, not taking the film in a "sophisticated" way. They were dead wrong. For Satantango actually contains a huge amount of funny moments, moments we're supposed to laugh at. As does this film.

Besides that, ever head of "nervous laughter." When something is so confrontational and hard to deal with all one can do is laugh? I think we can safely assume Seidl expects and is courting this reaction.

[–] Sonmi 11 years ago

I honestly can't tell if you're trolling or not, but if you thought those three scenes were intended to be laugh-out-loud funny, then your own understanding of the film is immature, at best.

[–] ScottCummings1977 10 years ago

Actually, from the horse's mouth, I know this. I also know he laughs quite often on set. You can PM me if you want to proof, but you'll have to take my side if you do