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A meticulous depiction of the numbing and normalizing effects of television, Michael Haneke's 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance (1994) "is the most intelligent and powerful study by cinema" (Maximilian Le Cain, Senses of Cinema) of the 20th century's quintessential medium.
A "cool, cerebral and painstaking" (Time Out London) examination of several characters, including an Austrian university student who goes on a shooting spree, the third installment of Haneke's "glaciation trilogy" is a mosaic of 71 film tableaux - beautifully shot by cinematographer Christian Berger (Cache and The Piano Teacher).
In 71 Fragments, clips of TV news segments on warfare in the former Yugoslavia alternate between stories of urban disconnection. And while continuing to approach filmmaking from an anti-psychological perspective, German-born Haneke assembles a unified work from snippets of narrative, such as Inge (Anne Bennet) and Paul Brunner (Udo Samel) struggling with a newly adopted daughter, and a homeless Romanian boy wandering the streets of Vienna. Moreover, and as expected from Haneke, 71 Fragments closes with an unforgettable cinematic punch, which also stands as a presage of his "later masterpieces by virtue of both its style and thematic core" (Adam Bingham, Senses of Cinema).
Udo Samel