The shots and sounds are beautiful and raw. The color of the film relates to the physical place and emotional place of the characters. It connects with the music that follows the same course. The acting is heartfelt as well, really emotional,...
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The shots and sounds are beautiful and raw. The color of the film relates to the physical place and emotional place of the characters. It connects with the music that follows the same course. The acting is heartfelt as well, really emotional, though I felt that there was a lack of chemistry between Holly Hunter and her male counterparts. Nonetheless, the story is a beautiful one. Holly plays the part of Ada, an unmarried mother of a little girl, who lives and breathes by her piano. Her father marries her away, like a piece of luggage and consistent with the times, and she moves to live with her daughter on a New Zealand colony. She strikes the viewer as very serious, melancholy, and yet devoted to two things, playing the piano and ensuring her daughter's happiness/safety/life. Upon arriving in the new land, however, she loses her piano and it is George (Keital) who manipulates the situation in order to spend more time with her. It really is a rouse to sleep with her and, though he loves her, it's still a bit underhanded and despicable. What a selfish man! I'm not saying one must live one's life according to social customs. Quite the contrary, I'm merely saying you don't intentionally set out to mess up someone's situation. But then, the viewer will quickly change allegiances and root for the pair as Ada makes it clear she does love him and her cuckolded husband literally chops off her finger! I get he's frustrated. He's been married for quite some time and has yet to consummate the marriage but the sheer brutality of it was too much. Yet another selfish man. She doesn't love you. Move on! Anyway, when she leaves with George, daugther in tow, she has a moment where she must choose between life and death and her will, ever strong throughout the film, chooses to break away from the piano, and all its moorings, and choose life, a life with brightness, mimicked by the shots, and vitality and love. The end is the happy ending you yearn for but beautiful nonetheless. It's a great movie and, if nothing else, there many a gratuitious shot of Harvey Keitel looking fit and cellulite free!

Holly Hunter is wonderful as the mute (but not deaf) girl, whose piano means everything to her (Hunter did all her own playing for the film!), as was Harvey Keitel her would-be and eventually lover who has her piano brought up from the beach,...
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Holly Hunter is wonderful as the mute (but not deaf) girl, whose piano means everything to her (Hunter did all her own playing for the film!), as was Harvey Keitel her would-be and eventually lover who has her piano brought up from the beach, where her husband left it--in spitre of, or perhaps ebause, it meant so much to her, to the near-jungole like mountainous terrain where both he and she and her husband (Sam neill, also excellent() live. It's a strange relationship keitel and Hunter have, but it is NOT the transporting of a piano for favors in bed. When the (justifiably--but what had he offered her? Nothing!) jealous husband fially does something horrible to her, she flees to Keitel, who takes her away,to a better (and flatter!) place.

It's funny, the little girl, Hunter's daughter, WAS the best actor (she won the Oscar, too)--but I cam never remember exactky what she did--except rat on her mother...

I thought that the "Piano" was a decent movie, but I found the story to be a little bit sick--a man who will transport a piano for a mute woman in return for favors in bed? In any event, the settings were beautiful and the film was well...
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I thought that the "Piano" was a decent movie, but I found the story to be a little bit sick--a man who will transport a piano for a mute woman in return for favors in bed? In any event, the settings were beautiful and the film was well acted.