Why do they wear these white gloves all the time.. and their white shirts never had any blood stains? and peter and paul were very pale (white) and looked really sick.
Someone also noticed Peter washing his white gloved hand in the lake?
And what's about the eggs ? And Peter and Paul keep on talking about food and eating all the time.
The white clothes might be a nod to clockwork orange??
White could represent many things. Devoid of colour, hence feeling, emotion, compassion, and remorse, etc.
It goes along with Peter and Paul's supernatural, ghostly quality in the film.
There are probably many interpretations, but the film realizes that white can be menacing, and that makes an intuitive sense.
Eggs are white too.... They function in the opening scenes, I think, to express the kind of fragile veneer, or shell, of quaint niceness between the wife and Peter, and the eggs breaking creates tension, foreshadows how that nice veneer is going to be crushed.
Someone said they were Angels who were messing with people, it's why they have special powers over reality.
"Get ready for an all new Biohazard ... now let's listen to Beyoncé!!"
Not sure if I buy the angel interpretation. They have powers in the film but only to break the flow of the story. Angels are conventionally thought to be guardians or protectors, I believe. IN any case, they are seen to be benevolent.
The Peter and Paul names suggest some kind of religious tone. My biblical knowledge is not good, but I think Peter was a Saint who was known for following Jesus. and Paul was a missionary. I don't see the meaning here, but that's my own lack rather than the film's.
They are D'jinn.
share
These are both very good explanations thank you for this!
I thought maybe white clothing/color implies also some general sort of reliance or innocence or even peaceableness. Like the doctor's lab coat or the brides's dress or the white dove.
It's like we (the audience) wish to participate in all sorts of explicit killings and rapings in todays movies without having to bear any (moral?) responsabilty and without soiling our hands. Maybe that's why there're hardly any blood stains on Peter's or Paul's gloves/clothing , it's as if these killings never really happend, which would also fit the virtual reality dialog at the end. The question is why should we really bother? It's just fiction after all.
I thought they wore the gloves so that they wouldn't leave any fingerprints. Other than that it looked like their golf outfits, Paul presents himself as an avid golfer after he makes his entrance.
A bit simple, but them being angels seems too far-fetched.
The color white represents innocence in its many forms. It could be either to deceive the audience or to show that Peter/Paul aren't touched by their own atrocities. They are going trough their acts like a boy playing a computer game or watching a movie.
I believe, the breaking of the eggs is a symbol for destruction of the fragile and cherished peace this family/society has created for themselves.
I think too much is being read into their appearance. Many people wear white while golfing and as mentioned in the film, it's something people in those parts do often.
They were wearing gloves so no finger prints would be found.
They chose to borrow some eggs because it's something commonly borrowed from neighbour to neighbour... like flour or sugar.
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We've met before, haven't we?
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What's so impossible about them being avid golfers? I saw them as being bored, rich kids.
Care to enlighten as to what the white outfits, gloves and eggs meant?
We've met before, haven't we?
By wearing clean white clothes and being well groomed they looked more presentation, more reputable.
They didn't look like thugs, hence why they were able to get their way into the family's home through persuasion and trust.
If they'd been skinheads wearing dark hoodies and jeans whilst smoking and grunting then they'd look like they could be a bit dodgy from the start.
.......
"Ray, when someone asks if you're a God, you say "YES"!
just an idea but maybe they wear white because they haven't been coloured in yet. ok so what i mean is the film is aware that it is a film. and it asks you questions about what films are. and these two are the ones who instigate the whole self aware theme of the film. and this is just one in what could be an ever repeating cycle of repetition (in the end they start again.)
so it's as if they're no one, just a filmic thought: 'what if two guys did this...?' and they (intentionally) haven't been thought through or given full characters. they're just pieces, toys that the director is using in a game they weren't mean to be used in: he puts them in a family's vacation. in the same way that you could draw a moustache on a photo in a newspaper
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We're gonna drink this one to Ozzie. A good man who tried to save my ass by injecting me into yours
Interesting interpretation.
sharewell, here is the dumbest explanation -
They are golfers, they wear gloves.
Knock yourselves out on the metaphoric meaning though.
I see it as a reference to Clockwork Orange, and also maybe that they are some sort of mimes,
There's a lot taken from clockwork orange "georgie boy" for instance....and the eggs as well I think....In a scene in clockwork orange the shrink asks alex his opinion about a picture of some eggs, and he says "i'd like to smash 'em"
well since you're naked you might as well f___ a friend of mine. Paul come in here!
I think it's interesting that just before the deadly counting game, Peter drops the eggs (again)...and there is a close-up of three broken eggs laying on the floor. This can be read as ominous foreshadowing: Three family members being tormented and none of them will emerge from this horror alive. Their lives are as fragile as eggs in the hands of their captors.
For me, the eggs are symbolic of bourgeoisie complacency. One important theme of the film is fragility--the fragility of a comfortable lifestyle, the fragility of life, etc. Eggs are a perfect metaphor for this. In a way, I think Haneke mocks the upper-class suburban lifestyle with this film. Ironically, the security systems which are supposed to keep external threats out serves to trap the family throughout the film.
This film is so fun to analyze because Haneke is so sure of what he wants to accomplish and has filled this film with various meta-textual layers. A pleasant vacation becomes a deadly serious and futile struggle for survival. This parallels the viewer's experience. Audiences go in expecting a typical thriller, easily navigated with the conventional markers of conventional genre expectations, and because of this, Haneke is in complete control of the audience. It's extremely Hitchcockian.
There are two levels of "funny games" being played: that of the sadistic tormentors upon the family, and that of the director upon the audience. Haneke is conducting the audience's emotions to be in full sympathy with the family by overlapping these experiences. Just as the sadistic villains possess a chilling hyper-awareness and absolute control over the situation, Haneke has a few tricks up his sleeve.
And you will know my name is The Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee!
Was just watching the extras on the dvd copy I rented. The director talks about Peter and Paul as not characters but 'archetypes' (hence changing their names around--Beavis and Butthead/Tom and Jerry etc.) Also that one of the boys is like a 'whiteface' clown and the other an 'auguste' or foolish clown. One is serious, the other silly.
Not sure how much any of that helps with the clothing, but I think it was interesting.
Also, he said that he got the premise of the movie from hearing about upper-class, bourgeois kids committing crimes for no reason other than the thrill of it. I think that their white clothing, politeness and aptitude for golf and sailing is all to indicate that they are rich kids; i.e. there is no motive behind what they are doing other than boredom.