71 Fragmente einer Chronologie des Zufalls (71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance)

This concluding piece of a merciless trilogy about fatal outbursts of irrational violence in contemporary Vienna is seen as the strongest film from Haneke’s early period when the Austrian slanderer made use of strong, analytical and even unrelenting style, without compromise. This time the modal Austrian whose fuse blows is a nineteen year old university student who one day begins shooting randomly in a bank, fatally injuring innocent bystanders, and then takes his own life. Haneke depictsthe last days and hours in the lives of people who were in and around the bank at the fatal moment in 71 fragments filmed with static cameras,. His mosaic of chance and contemplation about what connects a murderer and his victims is admirably restrained and compellingly constructed.