The Movie Caché: An Austro-French take on hidden guilt.

There are lots of papers to grade and clinical work to do and we are having house-guests tonight, but I have to write about the movie I saw last night, Caché (2005).  There is some irony here.  The movie was shown at a gathering at the Psychoanalytic Institute and the reluctant wife chose not to go because so many movies shown there are, as she says, like watching paint dry.  She qualifies that by saying that it is frequently interesting paint, but paint none the less.  And this movie qualified.  Nothing happened for long stretches.  And when things did happen they were disorienting.  It was unclear for a long time who the characters were and what was going to happen.  And there was no sense of urgency for a very long time.  So my urgency to write is somewhat ironic.

My hurry to write is also likely doomed to failure.   In a quick scan, there are many who have seen the film who cannot solve the riddle of how the plot works (and yet it is considered one of the best movies of the 2000s).  Roger Ebert and many others have tried.  And the Director, Michael Heneke, an Austrian master filmmaker, revels in the fact that the movie is insoluble.  So, with the help of the hour and half conversation we had in the wake of the film, I am going to wander where I should probably not tread.  I am going to do this in an unconventional manner – of course this is an unconventional film, so maybe I will get where I intend to go.  But I won’t be describing the film’s plot – at least not initially – per se.  Instead I will describe what I think is being portrayed by the film – with the intent of discovering why the confusion about the plot that is at the heart of watching it is integral to the success of it as a movie.

This is a film that centers on at least two and maybe three family groups and their responses (guilt, shame and anger) to hidden secrets - caches.  The first is Georges (Daniel Auteuil), his mother (Annie Girardot) and his now deceased father.  This family was one of means.  They lived in a large French Farmhouse and two of their field hands – Algerian Muslims – went to Paris in October 1961 to protest the French Government’s treatment of the Algerians.  They were apparently killed in a massacre.  They had left their son with the family and Georges’ parents decided to adopt the child – Majid (Maurice Benichou). 

Georges was angry that he now had to share a room with Majid (this must be metaphorical - the farmhouse was huge).  Further, Majid had blood coming out of his mouth.  I also think – and I certainly could be wrong about this – I have not obsessively watched the film five or more times as others have done – that in the confrontation between Majid and Georges, Georges intimates that they had an ongoing relationship that involved something about which they might both be implicated, or that he would still be vulnerable to.  We know that Georges told Majid that his father wanted him to kill one of their roosters and that when he did that, Georges told his parents that Majid had killed the rooster to scare him and they packed him off to an orphanage.  So the surface guilt is that Georges prevented Majid from having the life that he might have had as the adopted son of the landed gentry.  But I think there is more here.  I think that Georges and Majid may have had a sexual relationship – or maybe they played aggressively in ways that caused Majid to bleed – or who knows what?  And I think that Georges may have a suppressed reservoir of guilt for a bunch of stuff that gets reduced, in the film, to his guilt for removing Majid from the family.

Now this first family has a shadow family – the country of France.  The murder of Majid’s parents was ordered by Maurice Papon, the chief of French Police and the only Frenchman to be convicted for deporting Jews to German concentration camps during the Second World War.  So in addition to Georges’ hidden guilt we have France’s hidden guilt around putting both masses of Algerians (in retaliation for individual terror attacks) and before that Jews in concentration camps and then suppressing the Algerian demonstrations against the illegality of this, killing Algerians and covering that up.  And the person who is going to help us unravel this knotty guilt (or not) is an Austrian director – a man from a country that knows a thing or two about guilty complicity.

The second family is Georges’ family.  He is now an adult and has married Anne (Juliette Binoche).  He is the leader of an intellectual discussion group on public television.  She is a successful editor in a publishing house and the author’s book that she is promoting is doing very well.  They live behind a  hedge in a small nondescript house whose center is a book lined room that seems to insulate them from the world.  They live here with their 12 year old son, Pierrot (Lester Makedonsky), an adolescent who is psychologically remote - verging on sullen. The poster of Eminem in his bedroom hints at generational chasms in aesthetic interest.

When videotapes of their house which record their comings and goings show up on their front porch, Georges and Anne feel tremendously threatened.  It is as if a simple record of their lives would incriminate them.  Now, don't get me wrong, it is creepy to have someone watching - it verges on stalking - but the reaction seems stronger.  It is as if if people were to observe what we really did, we could not defend our actions.  And the odd thing is that as viewers, we buy into the threatening nature of these packages.  We believe that there is hostile intent behind recording comings and goings.  Now, of course we are watching a movie, and we expect some action to occur, but the weird thing is we spend the first five or six minutes of the movie watching this footage and it could not be more innocuous.  Nothing happens.  There isn’t even any paint drying.  After about four minutes a car goes by so that we know we are actually watching a movie, but to that point it could just have been a photograph;  with no sound, no music.  Wow.  And this – when Georges emerges from the house – ah – that is the action that has been recorded.  There is nothing in the bag.  No message.  There is just this incriminating tape – of nothing.  A man leaving his home on the way to work...

This creates a rift between Anne and Georges.  And the assumption is that Georges has done something wrong.  And the assumption grows into it being something illicit – perhaps an affair is what I think as I watch.  Anne is frustrated – indeed increasingly rightfully angry that Georges won’t tell her what is going on.  She is frustrated that he won’t trust her.  Across time, Georges creates a hypothesis – we later know that it is that Majid is behind this – but he won’t share it with Anne because, he states, it is only a hypothesis. 

All of this directing blame towards George throws some shade because we learn, much later in the movie, that the sullen son suspects that Anne is having an affair with her boss Pierre (David Duval), a married man who, along with his wife, has a warm relationship with Georges and Anne.   Indeed, the relationship is so warm that, when Anne is disturbed by Georges’ failure to trust and the new tapes that show up, she has lunch with him and we observe his caring response to her crying and they look, to all the world, like lovers – except for one small detail.  She does not ask Pierre if he would deceive her as Georges has – but instead asks Pierre if he would deceive his wife.  I think they are not lovers.  But Pierrot (the son) does – and neither Anne nor Georges consider the possibility.  Perhaps Anne’s conscience is clear – but Georges assumes his own guilt and that clouds his ability to see broader possibilities.  On the other hand, as the movie progresses, we match up the material from the tapes (additional tapes arrive, including one of his childhood home), and the crude drawings that he, Anne and Pierrot receive - each showing a child's face with red paint coming out of the mouth - and one showing a rooster with a slash of red paint across its throat, with Georges' memories of his childhood and we suspect that Majid is stalking them.

Pierrot, like his father before him, is concerned that his mother’s affections will not remain focused on her family – but that she will betray him by betraying his father.  Georges felt betrayed by his mother’s taking in Majid.  Pierrot is convinced that his mother is in love with Pierre.  Both boys feel that their maternal  foundation is shaky.  Georges felt that he could be replaced – or perhaps he felt that he was being irreparably sullied by Majid – while Pierrot fears that his mother’s affection for Pierre will rob him of his home.  Perhaps this matches Papon's fear about the motherland - that her love for him is fickle and needs to be protected against being directed at the infidel Algerians.

Which brings us to the third family: Majid now has a son.  They may live together – it is not clear.  Majid lives in housing for the poor in a Parisian low rent neighborhood.  Georges discovers him in the apartment where one of the mysterious video tapes leads him.  Georges is frightened but also threatening.  Majid is remarkably calm and centered and, in a very believable way, denies any knowledge of the tapes.  He is curious why Georges is so agitated.  He seems to want to talk to Georges and, only now, thinking about it, I wonder why Georges does not sit down, despite the tapes, and say, “What’s up?  Weird that our paths have crossed…  How did things turn out for you?”  Instead there is the confrontation mentioned before that I think is ambiguous.  It seems to me that Georges may feel guilty for more than having sent Majid off.  That said, it is evident that he is, indeed, feeling very guilty for that – and very scared of Majid.  His reverie about Majid killing the rooster ends with Majid turning on him ax in hand.  Is he scared of Majid?  Or is he scared of what he has done to Majid?  Is he afraid that he will be punished for what he has done wrong?

Georges’ mother can sense his guilt based anxiety when he visits her, and his wife Anne lovingly confronts him about his guilt – we learn about it through her questioning of him.  The Director has hinted, apparently, that this film may just be Georges' dream - and if so, it is a guilt laden dream - one in which he is being pursued not so much by a flesh and blood Majid, but the one that in his mind he has irreparably harmed.  In the movie, his threats towards Majid are recorded on a videotape.  They are delivered to his house after he has told Anne that he did not find anyone at the apartment.  He is caught in a lie and she realizes his guilt.  The tape is also sent to his boss and his boss warns him that someone is trying to ruin his career.  If this is Georges' dream, there is no way out of his guilt - confronting the one he has harmed simply underscores his guilt and he is now more vulnerable than he was before.

Then Pierrot turns up missing.  Anne has a contained kind of franticness to her – but Georges is devastated.  He finds a space to be alone – and he cries the cry of a father for his lost son – he sobs because he feels responsible for him.  As an observer, I am pleased that Georges is human and that he feels as deeply connected to Pierrot as he does - as I do to my son.  But I also am afraid for him.  I am convinced that Majid will (or has) killed Pierrot in revenge  and I fear that Georges will never recover from having been responsible for the death of someone he loves.  He takes the police to Majid’s house, and from there we go with Majid and his son to the jail overnight.  I think it is important that Majid’s son (Malik Afkir) does not have a name.  He is simply Majid’s son.  And he, too, denies that he is involved in the taping (and the kidnapping).

The next day, Pierrot shows up.  He has been at a friend’s and neglected to call.  I am glad you are back and I am so mad I could wring your neck – except that Pierrot’s friend’s mother attempts to absolve the guilt by claiming that  it is her faulty – she was working a late shift and should have made sure that Anne knew that Pierrot was there.  It is apparent that she is from a lower class family and feels guilty for having interrupted the upper class calm.  Pierrot, for his part, confronts his mother about her, in his mind, infidelity, which she denies.

I have gotten bogged down in the plot, something that I very much wanted to avoid.  But I can no more avoid it than Georges can avoid the elements that are now unrolling not as paint drying, but as a crazy barrel rolling down a hill.  The critical plot moment occurs when Georges hears again from Majid who invites him into his apartment again.  George enters only to have Majid tell him that he has called him there to witness his death and slits his throat – enacting the primitive pictures that have been sent.  Majid’s son confronts Georges at his work, ultimately claiming that he wants to see what a man looks like who is guilty of having destroyed another man.  And then we see – from the same still camera position that we saw Georges’ apartment – Majid being hauled off as a child to the orphanage - a heart rending scene.   Georges’ admits his guilt to Anne, goes to work, comes home early, and takes two sleeping pills, closes the curtains and goes to sleep.  

That last paragraph does not tell things as they occurred in the movie.  There are some details that I have inserted, and the order is wrong, but putting it right is not going to fix it.  I, as observer, am now so disoriented that elements cannot be kept straight.  This part of the movie is most reminiscent of the disorder than can be felt in a dream and then in its recall when the order of elements seems to shift in our minds as things don't make sense.  If this is a dream, I think it is the dream of a profoundly guilty man - a man who is so guilty – and so caught up in what he has deprived the other of having – that he cannot recognize the other – especially the value of the other.  I think this may be the dream of the guilty – the nightmare of the guilty.  Whether it is Georges or Papon – the Paris chief of police – or Georges’ parents – or Pierrot’s mother – or the dreams of privileged whites in America – we cannot access the subjectivity of those that we fear we have harmed because to do so – to have a record of what we have done – exposes us to overwhelming feelings of guilt – guilt that leads us to be destructive.  We are destructive of the other – we shoot or kill him.  In our dreams they kill themselves over us – we are that important.  They cannot lead good lives if we don’t create a space for them to do that.  As if they are meaningless without us.  And we, above all, can’t cop to that – to our essential selfishness.

James Cone, on my campus recently, suggests that the way out of this mess is, as a Christian, to identify with the oppressed.  In our culture it would be with the blacks who have been lynched and those who have been terrorized by the lynch mob.  In France, it would be an identification with Majik and the Algerians.  The director of this film, Micheal Haneke, has a grimmer message.  It is that our guilt imprisons us and keeps us apart from those who might offer us salvation.  We hide and fear them.  They must be irrevocably angry with us for what we have done to them.  We can’t be open to them.  We can’t reconcile – our guilt is irremediable.

Who did the taping?  Who sent the tapes?  There are three suspects.  Majid is the first.  He could be as wrapped up in what Georges did to him as Georges imagines.  If he is, he is a damn good liar.  He genuinely seems surprised by the issues of the tapes and genuinely seems interested in Georges, despite his feelings about him.  Majid’s son is the second.  He may feel even more robbed than Majid – but how would he know about all this if Majid had come to terms with it?  Is the son that disaffected that he channels his energies into – what? – confronting his father’s hated nemesis?  But then isn’t he guilty for having brought this terrible fate on his father?  Of course he would deny that, and blame Georges – as he does – but he would still be supporting the centrality of Georges in the life not just of Majid but of Majid’s family.  And Pierrot.  How does he have access to Majid?  How would that work?

The movie ends with an enigmatic image.  For the second or third time, we observe the front of Pierrot’s school as it is letting out.  Parents are waiting for some children.  Other children connect with each other before heading out – whether to get into off-screen cars or buses or the metro or just to walk home.  Each time this scene occurred, I was reminded of waiting for the reluctant son outside of schools or bus stations or airports.  Like in those places, we have a lazy anticipation – we’re watching paint dry.  There is tons of irrelevant information that we don’t care about and that can lull us to sleep because it bores us – but somewhere in the midst of all that stuff is the thing we are looking for – so we have to remain vigilant despite being largely uninterested.  And we – or at least I – am anxious.  Will I be able to pick him out of the crowd?  What is he wearing?  Is he is distinct?  (and truth be told, with the baseball team, when a bunch of skinny boys are wearing uniforms, I sometimes mistake him for someone else). 

After watching for a while, Pierrot emerges.  I recognize him by his distinctive curly hair, but also then by the way he walks - his lean and lanky body.  And it is like picking out the reluctant son (when I am able to), there is a warm spot for Pierrot.  But then something odd happens – he and Majid’s son (Majid’s son? What is he doing here?  Is he going to hurt Pierrot?) drift together and start talking.  Then they drift apart and exit the scene going in different directions.  They are friends?  So the mystery of who did the taping becomes more complex.  Did they collude?  Was this a shared plot?  Were they trying to figure out and intervene in the sins of the fathers?  Did they commit their own sins in doing that?  Are they complicit – have they engaged in some variant of the play that I suspect Majid and Georges engaged in?

Majid said, in the interaction with Georges, that he had seen Georges on TV and, in the time before Georges’ name was announced, when Majid did not yet know exactly who he was, he had this sick feeling in his stomach.  What is that feeling about?  Was it simply about having been displaced by Georges?  Or was it about whatever had gone on between them before that?  Or was it the whole mess?

If Pierrot and Majid’s son have colluded to try to untangle what tied their parents together, they have failed – miserably.   If Anne hoped to help Georges get beyond the guilt that he feels for things long past, she failed just as badly.  Georges is trapped at the end of this movie in a dark room where he needs to take pills to sleep - presumably to deaden the images that haunt him.  Majid, if this isn’t just Georges’ dream, is dead; killed as surely by Georges as his parents were by Papon.  We are left with the sense that this intergenerational killing will not be ended by the guilt, but sustained by it. 

Our forefathers emigrated to this country with the thought that we could leave all of that mess behind – we could build a new place unfettered by the hierarchical difficulties of a monarchical system  (we would just have to bring slaves to clear the land we stole from Native Americans to do it).  We put in place our own hierarchical system founded on the concept that all men are created equal – when we weren’t, including the women among us.  We have spent the past 200+ years working to achieve that equality and, in the process, have built in the same kinds of resentments that fuel the never ending cycles of damage and revenge on the European continent.  We are no strangers to sado-masochistic relationships and the guilt and shame that emerge from them.  We engage in them all too heartily.  And, as a result, we too, just like the Europeans we scoff at, are stuck in intractable trans-generational relationships that undermine our integrity – that keep us stuck.  Recognizing our guilt – something that Cone and Ta-Nehisi Coates would have us do – is easier said than done.  If, however, we, like Georges, keep those feelings at bay, we, like Georges, will find that our walls of books are inadequate to protect us and will realize, at some point, that it is the thoughts inside us that are insidious and, incapable of thinking them, we will numb them and fall into a stupor.

One question is whether psychoanalysis is a solution to this mess.  It may help us untangle the threads of a dream (in the dream, the person who is recording all is Georges - who happens - in dreams - to know things that can't be known - like where Majid is living).  But, for it to be effective, psychoanalysis requires an analysand who is curious about a different solution - about a way out of the situation in which there is no possible solution - because it is me that has to change, not the world.  I have to recognize that others have value - not just me - and this is hard to do when I am at the top of the heap.  Might Majid have had a fine life?  Might Majid have been so disturbed by his parent's death that he was not a fit sibling for Georges?  Did Georges' mother recognize this and take action?  Could it be that Georges was so uncertain of his mother's love that keeping Majid as a brother would have been worse for Majid than being sent to an orphanage?  Georges' mother is still disturbed by what happened, but she has come to some sort of peace - some sort of resolution - something that she can sense Georges has not done.  

Georges' privilege makes him vulnerable.  He fears that owning his guilt - acknowledging it - will lead to everything being taken away - to his being exposed.  I think he is being exposed as human - as filled with powerful and even violent feelings - much like the characters in the books that he discusses on TV - but different - this is a kind of reality TV that he cannot survive.  Were he to have his book lined den taken away it would be as devastating as having his son taken away - and he fears that Majid - or Majid's son - is intent on doing this.  He believes that Majid seeks not justice - not reconciliation - but revenge.  As if all that Majid wants is for Georges to suffer.  When we become locked into that, Freud sees us as Melancholic - something that he contrasts with being mournful.  Mourning can resolve - melancholia - here characterized as being tied into the lost connection in a way that is frozen by guilt - cannot, unless the person is willing to see the situation in new and different ways.  The frozen quality of the videotapes - including watching Majid being taken off to the orphanage from the frozen camera vantage point - suggests that this is something that Georges is not able to do - thus the tragic and dislocated quality of the film - especially as we identify with Georges.  From this perspective, the inability to solve the plot problems points to a bigger problem - that Georges' is incapable of resolving his own guilt in a way that will be generative.  If Majid's son and Georges' son are meeting in a public school - and if they can come to be friends, there may be a glimmer of hope for future generations.

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