HOLLY HUNTER SAM NEILL HARVEY KEITEL
and ANNA PAQUIN
star in
A film by Jane Campion
THE PIANO
Triple Oscar Winner
Best Actress.....Best Supporting Actress.....Best Original Screenplay
VHS - PAL - NEW - Never played!! - 13+ -rated - Colour - 1993-release - 114-minutes - Drama, Music, Romance - Original VHS release in Australia - Large box
** NOTE: Some small crinkling of plastic sleeve from heat - from years of storage in warehouse - no impact on box or VHS-tape **
It is the mid-nineteenth century.
Ada cannot speak and she has a young daughter, Flora.
In an arranged marriage she leaves her native Scotland accompanied by her daughter and her beloved piano.
Life in the rugged forests of New Zealand's North Island is not all she may have imagined and nor is her relationship with her new husband Stewart.
She suffers torment and loss when Stewart sells her piano to a neighbor, George.
Ada learns from George that she may earn back her piano by giving him piano lessons, but only with certain other conditions attached.
At first Ada despises George but slowly their relationship is transformed and this propels them into a dire situation.
This is one of my all-time favorite films.
It combines masterful scripting, cinematography, performances, and musical score into a disturbing, erotic, and ultimately uplifting piece.
The movie's heroine, wonderfully portrayed by Holly Hunter, is mute (symbolic of the fact that she has no say in her own life), with her daughter (the astonishing Anna Paquin) and her piano as her personal obsessions.
Her conscripted husband, coldly played by Sam Neill, is trying to win her heart and her desire in all the wrong ways, while his crude tribal neighbor, sensually played by Harvey Keitel, understands her needs and ultimately captures her ... physically, intellectually, and romantically.
The film's message and its delivery are extraordinarily powerful, the cinematic technique is rich ... the sequence shot with Hunt, Pacquin, Keitel and the piano on the beach is one of the best pieces of work I've ever seen. Lasting impact.