Rania E
Three years ago, I was reading Jelinek's novel on a plane that was flying over Greenland. Maybe it was the combination of the intensely disturbing content together with being so high up in the air, but at some point I couldn't take it. It was too much. I blacked out- it was such an embarrassing moment. Airsickness, the air hostess thought. I would never admit it was a book, and for five hours afterwards I was afraid of re-opening it. I never got back to it since. Yesterday I finally found the courage to watch the film. It was followed by one of the worst nights in my life. I couldn't sleep. My chest hurt. I repeatedly sat up, struggled to think happy thoughts, to remember Schubert's music instead of Erika. I couldn't.What is most terrifying about this film is that Erika is not some monster. She is human. Her perversion, her self-hate, her capacity to hurt and self-hurt are not completely alien. They are real. They are possible. They exist in a person that you wouldn't just brush aside as "evil". And it is that split second of identification that makes the film very, very difficult to watch.As a musician, there was something disconcerting about hearing great music start off in a recital or rehearsal and then continue as a background for the dark, the cruel, the perverse. Haneke loves Schubert. Stay away from Schubert, Erika told Walter. Schubert must be left to an old age, many musicians advise. Schubert, who himself died at 31. Schubert, who portrayed loneliness more honestly and more painfully than any other composer- cold, bleak, longing for another but at the same time incapable of truly reaching out and communicating with another. It is too late, it is too late. And it seemed to me that Jelinek and Haneke are showing the other face of that loneliness, the shocking violence and cruelty that it is capable of.What is the function of art, I found myself wondering. Art is supposed to move us. There are so many ways one can be moved, and this one is particularly uncomfortable, particularly difficult. It turned my stomach. It drilled a hole in my spirit. There is still a knot underneath my chest, and everything around me is dark. Is it for a good purpose? If art shocks you, scars you, sends you so low that your awareness of existing is too heavy to take, is it so you can rise afterwards? Is art supposed to be "beautiful"? After other films by Haneke, like Amour or "The White Ribbon", I was disturbed, but it was good for me. It was good discomfort, good sadness. The kind that cleanses you and makes you grow. It's too early to say the same for the Piano Teacher. Will something come of this terrible, terrible feeling it left me with? I need more time to digest it and to reflect on it before I can discuss themes of loneliness and power and repression and genius and madness. But at least I know I will be thinking about them for a long time to come.
TBJCSKCNRRQTreviews
Being a piano teacher in a school isn't necessarily the most compelling job. Erika(Huppert, disappearing into the role) lives with her overbearing mother(Girardot, fleshing out what in the hands of a lesser talent would have been one-sided), who keeps close tabs on her. Both of them are single, lonely, missing the father, and feeling they've achieved what they could in their lives. She always retains control even when not the only authority(even in that situation, she doesn't "give" any), keeps her distance, doesn't smile, and claims to have no emotion. Her love of the music, that we are at times given rich explanations of, fits with her personality, and vice versa - clear rules for what is right and what is wrong, intelligent and reserved, refusing to cater to the masses. But she does have violent fantasies, and when she meets the young enthusiast of the classics Walter(Magimel, fantastic, holding his own against a woman 20 years his senior), she may be able to live them out - even if doing so poses great risks to herself.This is gripping from start to finish. It is not for everyone, and I mean no offense to those who aren't in the intended audience. There are a lot of long takes with few people in the shot, a lot of silence, few cuts or close-ups, little in the way of movement of the camera, and largely basic angles and compositions. It's driven by the acting and dialog(with many mean, even cruel, lines, to an extent equally divided between the leads - there is no room for failure in the perfectionist world of performing arts that require that much talent, nor is there a way to impress, at most, be thought to be "good enough"). There are no real plot twists, merely a spiral towards the inevitable awful outcome. This sets up some themes and characters, and explores them, thoroughly. Our protagonist has no make-up, and this is an example of this not holding back, not covering up imperfections, it is bare and harsh, and all the better for it. This is only the second film of Michael Haneke I've watched, the other being The White Ribbon, but I love both of them, and will be seek out more of his work.This goes into selfishness vs. sacrifice, disgust vs. understanding, complete acceptance vs. unrepentant rejection, what is proper and what is not. Add to that the way the world of yesterday's "sensual" (in direct contact with, not theory but talent for playing, composing) love of art being shoved aside by, and for the sake of, modern intellectualism(study of theory) and crowd-pleasers such as sports. Most of all, it is about sado-masochism. This goes into that subject without misrepresenting(unlike 50 Shades of Grey) and free of judgment. It is, however, deeply unsettling, showing the negatives that can come from it, whilst clearly showing that they aren't inherent to it. When it isn't practiced in a healthy relationship based on trust, where the partners use safe-words, consent and aftercare. Because when someone has suppressed something for the longest time, it can be an explosion when the faucet is finally turned on. We see how the greatest perversity may be borne of the strongest repressive environment, and that just because one's sexuality has not been expressed, doesn't mean it's gone.This contains a near-constant tension, mostly regarding disturbing content, a lot of sexuality, some of it graphic and/or violent. It is a movie that is sometimes arousing, other times revolting, one that dares you to look on yet is impossible to take your eyes off. I recommend this to everyone who is not put off by the subject nor the unflinching approach to it. 8/10
