Film Reviews

The Piano Teacher

• Rating:
• Director: Michael Haneke
• Starring: Benoit Magimel
• Details: Austria/ 122 mins / (No Cert).

Erika Kohut is a thirty-something professor of music at the prestigious Vienna Conservatory of music. Living with her domineering mother in a cramped city centre apartment, she fantasizes about having violent sexual encounters. The Piano Teacher is such difficult viewing that the director saw fit to issue a statement to accompany the release, stating: "It is, so to speak, a psychodrama, but without the explanations typical of a psychodrama". However, due to this lack of narrative structure and elucidation, The Piano Teacher is a well acted but directionless piece of work. The characters lack any sort of emotional redemption and Erika's obsessions defy any sort of logic, thus ensuring that there's no real bond with the audience.

Review by Garreth Murphy