She furiously signs to her nine-year-old daughter (Anna Paquin) who shouts at him on her behalf. Eventually, Stewart sells Ada’s piano to illiterate, tattooed Englishman who lives among the Maori natives named Baines (Harvey Keitel). Baines asks Ada to give him lessons, but Ada later learns that he will sell her back her piano in exchange for visits (one visit for every black key). Gradually, they start an affair, which is eventually discovered by Stewart, who snaps and makes Ada pay the price for her betrayal.
Ada is trying to express herself in an oppressive situation, something that plenty of women could relate to. She’s married by her father to an aloof, cold and frustrated member of civilized society, and is torn between him and Baines, more open about his feelings but crude about them.
So far, so dramatic, but The Piano has several major flaws which prevent it from being anything more than a good film.
One of the main themes in the Piano is Ada “finding her voice” which we’re supposed to believe she does by being held as a kind of sexual hostage by Baines, which I found hard to comprehend. Stewart’s outburst at the end was intense, but his character was too cold and unsympathetic for me to really care about his feelings. Dialogue is minimal, and you get the feeling they took as long to write as they did to say. There’s only so many times you can watch people, however good at acting they might be, delivering uninteresting lines with a stern expression before it becomes monotonous.
Holly Hunter’s performance is the strongest factor here, portraying a grim, mute woman in a three-dimensional character without uttering a syllable. Paquin, who won an Oscar at the age of 11 for her supporting role, does a good job as Ada’s brattish daughter.
However, too many questions are left unanswered; we are never told the real reason why Ada stopped speaking, and why exactly did she think it was a good idea to write a message on a piano key to someone who cannot read?
What The Piano lacks is new and interesting ideas, and ultimately fails to hold your interest. It’s intended to pull at the heartstrings but it’s monotonous style failed to strike a chord with this viewer.
