Staff Picks: The Piano Teacher

Dir. Michael Haneke
2001, France, 130 min
French and German with English subtitles
Rated R

Academy Award–winning Austrian director Michael Haneke shifted his focus from the social to the psychological for this riveting study of female sexuality and the dynamics of control, an adaptation of a controversial 1983 novel by Elfriede Jelinek. Haneke finds his match in Isabelle Huppert, who delivers an icy but quietly seething performance as Erika, a middle-aged piano professor at a Viennese conservatory who lives with her mother, in a claustrophobically codependent relationship. Severely repressed, she satisfies her masochistic urges only voyeuristically until she meets Walter (Benoît Magimel), a young student whose desire for Erika leads to a destructive infatuation that upsets the careful equilibrium of her life. A critical breakthrough for Haneke, The Piano Teacher—which won the Grand Prix as well as dual acting awards for its stars at Cannes—is a formalist masterwork that remains a shocking sensation.

Content warning: This film contains scenes of sexual violence.

Join us for our Staff Picks series, where our Winnipeg Film Group staff select and introduce new and old favourites. This month’s selection was chosen by Cinematheque Box Office Staff Saleena Haile. Generously sponsored by IATSE 856 Manitoba.