THE PIANO

New Zealand, 1993, 114 minutes, Colour.
Holly Hunter, Harvey Keitel, Sam Neill, Anna Paquin, Kerry Walker, Genevieve Lemon, Ian Mune, Cliff Curtis.
Directed by Jane Campion.

Jane Campion has made a telemovie, Two Friends, a bizarre black comedy, Sweetie, and the impressive portrait of Janet Frame, An Angel at My Table. The Piano has won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, Holly Hunter winning Best Actress. The Piano was nominated for 13 Australian Film Institute Awards and won for best film, director, screenplay, actor, actress. Holly Hunter and Anna Paquin won Oscars for their performances as did Jane Campion for her screenplay.

Awards and marketing created enormous expectations from audiences. The Piano is an art film and anyone who thought it an entertaining night out may well be disappointed. It is a demanding film.

Set in the rainforests of New Zealand (and its mighty wave-pounded coast), it is beautifully photographed. Michael Nyman’s score is both romantic and idiosyncratic, especially for the pieces played passionately on her piano by the heroine, Holly Hunter performing the playing herself.

The piano is the personal possession of Ada, who travels to New Zealand with her young daughter, Flora, for an arranged marriage with landowners Stewart (Sam Neill). She is mute, signing and interpreted (often with angry vigour) by her daughter. But she can communicate via the piano.

It should be said that the setting is the mid-19th century and Jane Campion has alluded to Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. This is helpful to appreciate the wildly exotic atmosphere, the tempestuous relationships as well as the colonial version of prim Victorian manners. Infrequent cinemagoers may be momentarily taken aback by some sexual sequences.

The acting is excellent. Holly Hunter, so versatile in Broadcast News, The Firm, Raising Arizona, gives an austere performance on the surface, it is the mute passion within is intensely communicated. Harvey Keitel offers a complex interpretation of a lonely man bewitched by the strange woman and her piano.

Sam Neill is the husband and has to convey some tenderness as well as being a man of his times, with colonial and chauvinist attitudes and behaviour that he is unaware of, a reticent style that can erupt in cruelty.

Anna Paquin, who has had a subsequent very successful career, is excellent as Flora.

Visually impressive, stylishly directed, both elegant and raw, this is a drama of the constraints of arranged marriages, of the amour fou, the madness of love, in a remote part of the world where the Maoris are being exploited (though they can still mock the newcomers) and despair is more than possible.

1. Acclaim for the film? Festivals, Australian awards, Oscars? The status of the film as a classic?

2. New Zealand production, Australian production, International background and cast?

3. The career of Jane Campion? Writing and directing this film? Her New Zealand heritage? Her perspective on women? Awards?

4. New Zealand, the coast, elemental, the sea, the shore and the sand, the forests, the rain and the mud, the homes in the forest, the town, the church? Costumes and decor?

5. The music, the background, Ada’s pieces, Holly Hunter playing, the classics and the celebration at Christmas?

6. The title, the focus, the piano for Ada, for George, Stewart? Symbol? The sensibilities of the director, the cast and their interpretation? The style of the photography, real, realistic, symbolic?

7. 1990s perspectives on men and women in the 19th and 20th centuries, especially the role of women? The narrow focus of the men, dominance and possession? Issues of sex and sexuality? Race, the Maoris? Ownership of the land?

8. Ada, Holly Hunter’s performance, her voice-over and her actual silence, the discussion going on in her head? In Scotland, her explaining the situation, with her daughter Flora, her decision not to speak, her being wilful, her choice, people not knowing her, the silences, her control? Her relationship with Flora and the decision to go to New Zealand? Packing, the piano, the voyage? A single woman with child travelling in the 19th century?

9. The landing, the boat, on the shore, the Maoris? George and his presence? Guarding the piano, Flora playing on the beach? Stewart, the Maoris carrying the bags, the decision to leave the piano on the beach?

10. Stewart, decent man, and uncomprehending about what was happening, his being mystified by Ada’s playing the car keys on the table with no sound? Morag agreeing with him? His being unaware of Ada’s expectations? Seeing her as small, trying to cope with Flora? The set up of the house? The work, Morag and Nessie, the Maoris present in house, Stewart and the deals to buy the land? His being straightlaced, the marriage, the photo for the wedding, discovering the truth, observing under the floor, shock? His reaction, anger with George? The brutality of his cutting Ada’s finger?

11. George, English, with the Maoris, his friendship with Stewart, fascination with Ada, getting the piano, the deal, her having to redeem the keys, her bargain about the black keys? His lifting her skirt, gradual revelations, the proposal to lie naked? The sexual encounter, the passion? The effect on George? No longer interested in the piano?

12. The effect on Ada, her determination, her agreement to the deal, George’s proposals, the passionate encounter?

13. Stewart, his marital rights, the photo, the dress? Ada being passive?

14. Flora, precocious, her sign language, speaking for her mother, with some vigour and insistence? Playing as a child? Wary, puzzled about her mother, going to George, the key with the message and her taking it to Stewart?

15. The Maoris, racial background, as a group, freedom, the elders, proposals about marriage, serving as porters? Yet able to mock the newcomers?

16. The Christmas play, the Reverend, the children, the angels, Christmas, the performance? Practising? Nessie, the Shadow play and the attack with the instrument – the Maoris’ fears that it was real and upsetting the performance?

17. Ada, the cutting off of her finger, losing interest in the piano? Being exiled by Stewart, sailing away? With George and Flora? Her wanting the piano to go overboard, her foot in the rope, going into the water, her option to live?

18. Nelson, a quiet life, her voice-over, the metal finger, her playing, her relationship once again with the music, her life, change?

19. A film of symbols and metaphors, music, the piano, the primitive forest and the mud, the water?