--- title: "Caché: the reviews" canonical: "https://film.one/film/cache/reviews" title_page: "https://film.one/film/cache" critics_score: 87 critics_reviews: 6 licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Caché (2005): what the critics said Critics' score 87 from 6 reviews: 6 positive, 0 mixed, 0 negative. The reviews are consistently positive about Caché, with praise centred on Haneke’s control of images and his use of surveillance to make watching feel uncomfortable. Critics repeatedly connect the couple’s private unease to questions of denial, racism and France’s colonial history. The long, static shots and uncertain boundary between recorded footage and unfolding action draw particular attention: the suspense comes from questioning what is visible, rather than simply waiting for the mystery to be solved. Performances also receive praise for sustaining that unease. There is little outright disagreement; the differences concern emphasis more than approval. Some critics concentrate on the political implications, others on guilt, family secrets and the audience’s complicity. Reservations are limited: The Skinny acknowledges frustrations and describes the film as demanding, while still recommending it. Across the reviews, the ambiguity is largely treated as a source of psychological pressure rather than a storytelling weakness. ## Slant Magazine — Joe McGovern Rating 4/4. 8 October 2005. The critic praises Haneke's cunning modern allegory that interlaces bourgeois complacency, subconscious guilt, and the impossibility of truth in film, condemning First World racism through the story of surveillance tapes and repressed colonial history. [Read the review](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/cache/) ## Film Comment — Paul Arthur Fi1m's normalised score 90/100 (inferred from the text). Haneke’s latest provocation is a masterpiece of urban dread and an exceptionally acute inquiry into human behavior and guilt. The director’s control of image, point of view, and the film’s productive enigma stand out as sources of its dramatic and psychological power. [Read the review](https://www.filmcomment.com/article/endgame-michael-hanekes-cache/) ## IndieWire Fi1m's normalised score 80/100 (inferred from the text). 19 December 2005. The review highlights Haneke's thriller about a couple receiving surveillance tapes that unearth personal and national guilt, commending its tense voyeuristic structure and political allegory. [Read the review](https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/culture/a-view-to-a-kill-michael-hanekes-cache-77504/) ## Los Angeles Times — Kevin Thomas 23 December 2005. The critic calls the film a psychological suspense drama of utmost rigor and originality that confronts individual and collective responsibility for past evils, particularly France's treatment of Algeria, through mysterious videos that torment a successful Parisian couple. Haneke's taut, ambiguous storytelling and natural performances keep the focus on uncomfortable truths that linger beyond the final image. [Read the review](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-dec-23-et-cache23-story.html) ## RogerEbert.com — Roger Ebert 13 January 2010. The critic describes the film as a thriller that coils tension inward rather than releasing it, focusing on a bourgeois Parisian couple tormented by surveillance videos and drawings that expose buried guilt from Georges's childhood. Haneke's precise camerawork and ambiguity shift attention from the mystery's solution to the psychological and historical consequences for the characters. [Read the review](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-cache-2005) ## Sight and Sound — Catherine Wheatley The critic examines Haneke's use of video surveillance and narrative tricks to explore guilt, denial, and complicity in personal and historical (colonial) contexts. She highlights the film's ability to unsettle viewers through simulation and its socio-political resonance beyond France. [Read the review](http://old.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/49266) ## The Guardian — Peter Bradshaw 27 January 2006. The critic calls Hidden Michael Haneke’s masterpiece and a compelling politico-psychological essay on denial and guilt in the foundations of western prosperity. He singles out the film’s forensic, dispassionate scrutiny of a bad dream and its implication of the viewer in the protagonist’s destructive gaze. [Read the review](https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2006/jan/27/2) ## The New York Times — A. O. Scott 23 December 2005. The review portrays the film as a nerve-rackingly suspenseful exploration of voyeurism, paranoia, and bourgeois self-satisfaction, beginning with a surveillance video of a comfortable Parisian couple's home that disrupts their lives. Haneke implicates the audience in the act of watching while probing themes of guilt, complicity, and the fragility of security. [Read the review](https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/23/movies/a-nice-middleclass-couple-with-their-own-stalker.html) ## Time Out — DC 19 March 2012. The critic praises the film as an unsettling, self-reflective masterpiece that marries thriller elements with ideas about guilt, racism, French history, and cinema. They single out the clever video conceit and the performances of Auteuil and Binoche for creating pervasive unease and complicity in the audience. [Read the review](https://www.timeout.com/movies/cache-2005) ## Eye for Film — Anton Bitel Fi1m's normalised score 85/100 (inferred from the text). 27 January 2006. The film is praised as a complex, non-conventional mystery that uses its voyeuristic structure to explore deep-seated personal and political guilt. It singles out the way the static, seemingly innocuous images implicate both the characters and the audience in acts of denial and complicity. [Read the review](https://eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/hidden-film-review-by-anton-bitel) ## Paste — Robert Davis Fi1m's normalised score 80/100 (inferred from the text). 23 March 2006. Haneke’s multi-layered, open-ended thriller fascinates on every level as both a suspense film and a versatile metaphor for family secrets, buried trauma, and national guilt. The critic singles out the director’s visual trickery—slipping between live action and videotape, and holding uncomfortably long shots—as what makes the mystery gripping without needing resolution. [Read the review](https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/cache-hidden) ## The Skinny — Paul Gallagher Rating ★★★★. 17 March 2006. Though demanding, Hidden rewards viewers with ample food for thought through its tense atmosphere and probing questions about families, moral responsibility, and French colonial history. The long takes, strong performances, and thought-provoking conclusion make it highly recommended despite its frustrations. [Read the review](https://www.theskinny.co.uk/film/new-releases/hidden-cache) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Our review: https://film.one/film/cache.md