“The Piano Teacher”
Winner—Cannes Festival Grand Jury Prize, 2001
Honestly, it’s sick….S/M sex indeed….though it is more verbal than physical. Erika’s “hobby” is so…so…eww.
Still, I didn’t really expect this movie to be like this. Acting was good though…and after reading the given reviews I looked at the movie with a “beyond what I see” perspective and saw that the movie does have a certain depth to it, in a psychological kind of way.
The movie really is a mix of bordering-madness, creepy unease, thought-provoking, and ridiculous. In Rechtshaffen’s words, “[It] is the kind of film that teeters on a very fine line between seat-shifting uneasiness and flat out silliness.” And that basically sums it up.
Synopsis/Summary:
[Non-spoiler summary]
Erika Kohut is a piano teacher at the Vienna Conservatory prestigious music school in Vienna. In her early forties and single, she lives with her overprotective and controlling mother in a hermetically sealed world of love-hate and dependency, where there is no room for men. Her sex life consists of voyeurism and masochistic self-injury. Lonely and alienated, Erika finds solace by visiting sex shops and experimenting with masochism. Ata a recital, she befriends Walter, a handsome young man, whom she seduces and with whom she begins an illicit affair. As Erika slowly drifts closer to the brink of emotional disorder, she uses the love-stricken Walter to explore her darkest sado-masochistic fantasies, which eventually lead to her undoing.
[Spoiler Warning *highlight to read*]
Erika is a sexually repressed piano professor in Vienna who is approaching spinsterhood and lives with her mother. When a student tries to seduce her, she agrees, but on her terms. The relationship ends unhappily when she reveals her extreme masochistic desires to him, which brings the relationship to an end, but not before he has made a disgusted attempt to enact his conception of her masochistic fantasies.
And there you have it. If you’re one with an indifference to sex themed movies or don’t easily become uneasy about it, I suppose you’ll be able to watch without going “Eww! So gross! So weird!” That’s about it. I’ve nothing more to say.
PS
“What the heck kind of ending was that?!” >>this I’m sure, is what you’d be asking yourself after watching the ending scene. But then again, I suppose it was to be expected. After all, a “conventional ending would be a cop out.”
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Piano_Teacherhttp://shopping.yahoo.com/p:The%20Piano%20Teacher%20(La%20Pianiste):1807866485:upc=738329026325