Review of The Piano (1993) by John A — 03 Aug 2008

Wonder what it would be to communicate through the music of a piano. You are silent not because you cannot speak, but because you firmly believe those who talk have nothing interesting to say. What if the piano became your soul? And what if it was taken from you?

The first forty-five minutes of 'The Piano' is perfect, outstanding cinema. Through patience, music and genuinely riveting story-telling director Jane Campion lures the audience into a sensuous tale of passion and intrigue. It may seem difficult to imagine the above by simply reading it, but watching 'The Piano' is like experiencing the pain of Holly Hunter's Ada, who lives her life in such an unorthodox way.

Ada and her young daughter, Flora, move from Scotland to a barely colonised New Zealand as part of an arranged marriage, and when her new husband refuses to transport her beloved piano to their new home, Ada is distraught. But her despair turns to anger when he sells it to a local farmer. "It is mine!" she writes.

In her desperation to be reunited with the piano, Ada begins tutoring the uneducated farmer, an arrangement which forms the foundations of an unexpected love affair. Holly Hunter proves you need not speak a single word to deservedly bag an Oscar; she is stubborn, resolute, and suffering without her piano. United with it she is calm, tranquil and whole.

'The Piano's intoxicating atmosphere is its most impressive asset. The direction is suffused in melancholy and pathos, and the cinematography and mise-en-scene is gloomy, but not dull; by witnessing the landscape almost through a grey lense the music transcends the usual effectiveness, all so we empathise with Ada's unworldy predicament.

As her daughter a young Anna Paquin is extremely talented; Flora is a girl who loves her mother, but also loves to cause mischief - and with some dire consequences. Sam Neill is adequate as Ada's husband, as is Harvey Keitel as her lover; the script doesn't offer them as fully realized characters as Hunter, but they certainly impress with the material they have.

Despite the director's attempts at a Victorian style love affair, she indulges in romantic melodrama far too often, which adds an unnecessary and tiresome arc to the film's middle section. Thankfully the ending is poetic and mutually uplifting, ideas of life and death cleverly intertwined, although not so effectively foreshadowed.

Although often claimed to be, I don't think 'The Piano' is a masterpiece. But it is both a devastating and life-affirming picture, and Hunter's performance is its soul as the piano's is Ada's. It works as a sophisticated piece of art, and a forceful tale of passion, lust and life, in an original method so far from mainstream offerings.