It's one thing for a thriller to go out of its way to establish a set of rules to abide by, only to ignore them for the sake of a few cheap twists. But Funny Games, Michael Haneke's remake of his own 1997 overseas picture, outrightly announces that it has no intentions of playing fair. I can see how the film would raise the ire of many a moviegoer, since it adamantly refuses, with both subtlety and sheer frankness, to play out the way the audience expects it to. However, although going against the grain and grind of the genre, Funny Games still finds a a way to keep viewers on their toes.

The well-to-do Farber family is settling in at their vacation home for a nice week at the lake. Patriarch George (Tim Roth), doting wife Ann (Naomi Watts), and little son Georgie (Devon Gearhart) are all set for a few days of fun, sun, and sailing. Out of nowhere shows up Paul (Michael Pitt) and Peter (Brady Corbet), a pair of young men who claim to be picking up some eggs for the neighbors. But their intentions are soon revealed to be much more sinister, for the boys proceed to incapacitate George with a golf club and make it very clear they aren't going to leave the house anytime soon. In fact, Paul and Peter have a game they want to play, with the most vital of prizes at stake: the boys simply bet that the family won't be alive at 9 A.M. the next morning, and the Farbers bet  they will. A battle of wits ensues between the two factions, although the young men always seem to have the upper hand, dead-set on doing whatever they can to make sure they win their deadly gamble.

Allow me to put some fears you may have about Funny Games to rest. I saw the foreign version before this remake, and back then I was afraid Haneke would use the film's staunchly anti-mainstream personality as a free pass to get away with any boneheaded plot twists he wanted without having to explain himself. Some viewers may have the same concerns about the new Funny Games, but I can tell you this isn't the case. Aside from one infamous scene in particular which  exists in both versions, Haneke is very clever concerning how he goes about playing against the expectations of the usual, Hollywood-weaned audience. Throughout the film, Pitt's character breaks the fourth wall and actually talks to viewers, asking if they think the Farbers will live and comparing what's happening in the story with what the audience thinks should be happening. A bit of an arrogant move on Haneke's part, doubting the taste of the American moviegoer? Perhaps, but in a country that made Meet the Spartans a #1 movie, I'm inclined to agree with the guy.

More important, though, is the atmosphere Haneke lends to Funny Games. It's not one of hopelessness but rather doubt. The characters aren't necessarily doomed from the start because the bad guys occasionally wink at the camera; there's always a twinge of possibility that maybe -- just maybe -- the good guys might win. If this turns out to be the case (I'm not telling you if it is), then Haneke isn't prepared to go down without a fight, consistently twisting the knife in the thematic wound just enough for viewers to retain their interest in whether or not the Farbers will survive their ordeal. Haneke leaves the door open for any number of occurrences to take place, and his stoic, almost detached sense of storytelling, just letting the chips fall where they may, makes things all the more effective. The man is a master of rendering the most unlikely of situations almost painfully suspenseful; you'll know what I mean when the story becomes so intense, the appearance of a golf ball will freak you out.

As for the main players in this wicked game, the results are surprisingly mixed, lending Funny Games the bulk of its few faults. Watts and Roth don't do  spectacular jobs, but they earn the viewer's sympathy, playing a perfectly nice couple who've really done nothing wrong to deserve the torment they're going through. Gearhart fares better as the plucky Georgie, who becomes the centerpiece of his own thrilling sequence, in which he attempts a daring escape from his captors. But as for the antagonists of the piece, I can't say I'm pleased with the results. There's nothing particularly wrong with the performances, since both Pitt and Corbet come across as perfectly creepy. The trouble involves them being too creepy to start; their overly-polite mannerisms and demeanors should've set off alarms ringing in Watts and Roth's characters right off the bat, for they might as well have been carrying neon signs saying "I AM EVIL."

Storywise, Funny Games shares a bit in common with the recent horror hit The Strangers, not to mention the acclaimed French chiller Them. But while the latter  films seemed content to do as little with their stories as possible, Funny Games comes across as much more playful -- in a diabolical sense, yes, but such an approach makes this game all the more rewarding.

MY RATING: *** (out of ****)

(Released by Warner Bros. and rated "R"for terror, violence and some language.)