THE PIANO
A film review by Roger A. Rubio
Copyright 1994 Roger A. Rubio
Starring Holly Hunter, Sam Neill, Harvey Keitel, and Anna Paquin Written and Directed by Jane Campion
I wanted to wait until after the Oscars to review this film, and I am glad that I did. I distinguish between the labels film and movie here with great caution, as this "piece" or "text," if you will, was a film, and *not* a movie. JURASSIC PARK was a movie; THE PIANO is a film.
Allow me to digress so that I may describe what I believe a film to be and a movie to be (before I get any flames from die-hard JURASSIC fans). A movie is what I would consider to be pure entertainment with little or no artistic content (a la DIE HARD I & II, BACKDRAFT, E. T., etc.). A film is an artistic venture with little or no entertainment content (a la 8-1/2, L'ATALANTE, PERSONA, etc.). These are the two extremes, and as always with film in general, there are gray areas. THE PIANO is what I would consider to be, without a doubt, an attempt to make a film, and not a movie.
Now that that's out of the way, on with the review. I mentioned that THE PIANO was an attempt to make a film, and not necessarily a film in itself. These may be just semantics, but I truly believe this film to be an attempt, and nothing more. THE PIANO is a very image-oriented film, filled with symbolism but lacking in overt substance. I found this movie to be a very good-looking movie, but found little else in the story or the characters. I found myself influenced by AN ANGEL AT MY TABLE, a previous Jane Campion film, which, while not making me do cartwheels, was an altogether good film. THE PIANO made me feel like I was being pulled this way and that. I felt like Campion was saying all throughout the writing and making of this film "Let's try this" or "This might be good." It felt haphazard to me, in that the story didn't seem to go anywhere.
It had a beginning, middle, and end. A first, second, and third act. It had a setup, a number of confrontations, and a resolution. Everything a typical Hollywood screenplay would require. But what was the point? The cinematography was breathtaking, the acting was satisfactory, and the images were highly symbolic. But why? Most artistic films don't follow the established "norm" of the Hollywood screenplay, mostly because artistic films usually don't have much of a script. This is not to belittle art films. On the contrary, this absence of established norms is what provides for the freedom of expression and individuality; the means by which to make us think in a different perspective. THE PIANO gave me little to think about. Why did a film like this, which leans so heavily towards the artistic side of the medium, choose such a common Hollywood cliche format in which to tell its story?
AN ANGEL AT MY TABLE had no big-name Hollywood stars in it, yet carried itself very well. THE PIANO has some relatively strong Hollywood heavyweights (Harvey Keitel and Holly Hunter). Why the change? I personally got nothing from Holly Hunter's performance. I thought she was good, but not deserving of an Oscar. Anna Paquin was very cute, but I didn't think she should have gotten the Oscar either (based on merit; I liked that she got to upstage all the other actresses). Harvey Keitel, again, plays a weird individual (the only really ordinary part I have seen him play was in THELMA & LOUISE), and, as always, pulls it off convincingly. Sam Neill is the only "foreigner" in this group (to Hollywood, that is, barring Anna Paquin), and was satisfactory at best. But I hate to speak of such good actors in this way, because I don't believe they were given really challenging parts to play. One may argue with me on this point, citing a "brave performance" by Holly Hunter, but I believe Campion made a grave mistake in creating this character: she let us into her head. We had a piece of her real character with us throughout the rest of the picture. No amount of acting on any actress's part (including Hunter's) would convince me that I am learning anything new about this person through her sign language; I know she can speak; she doesn't have to use it. I know her real character; everything else becomes a facade. I would have liked it if she expressed herself through facial or more subtle physical expressions (when she is injured [no spoiler attempt intended], the only way I know that she is in great pain is through Anna Paquin and through Harvey Keitel, and through other unmentionable things (if I'm not to spoil the film); Hunter showed me nothing, which led me to think that anyone could have played that part). I believe I can recognize good use of subtlety to make a point, a la HOWARD'S END, but even that fine film made me wonder what the point of all this was.
Symbolism abounds in this film, which threw me from the telling of the story. Then the story kicked in, which threw me from the appreciation of the images. Torn between two places. What exactly was going on here? Images of death and rebirth in this film are well-known to the artistically inclined; maybe they were "neato" things to the Academy and they awarded THE PIANO its share of Oscars based on that. Unfortunately, the Academy always awards based on politics, popularity, and career longevity. Never, if ever, on merit. Anna Paquin is cute, Holly Hunter was due again, and everybody in the Academy seemed to be taken aback by the screenplay to THE PIANO. These are the only reasons I can think of to award Oscars to the categories they did. If they awarded on pure merit, I think the Academy would have been confused with this film. I unfortunately did not have the opportunity to know the artist's intentions beforehand (it's usually easier to review a film based on the intentions of its creator), so all I can do is raise questions. "What was the point" is not meant as a harsh indictment of THE PIANO; it is simply a question. Even artistic films have a point!
THE SNAPMAN
rsnappy@polaris.unm.edu
(Roger A. Rubio)
.
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews