F06 :: Feminist Film Studies

I wanted to comment on the movie "The Piano," because it has now become one of my favorite movies. I love this movie mostly because of its silent emotion. I would guess that by watching this movie without any sound, It would be very easy to feel the emotion conveyed throughout the film. Holly Hunter does not need to say any words, because her face conveys all of her convictions. Her eyes and her gaze bring the audience into a world where we are now reading faces and feelings, and not measuring love by words.
This film has the essential quality of covering up all that is wrong about the world with romantic aspects. Holly Hunter comes to terms with the order of society by falling in love. Her strange love for music is easily translated to her passion for wanting love from a man. She is silent, so all of her emotions are let out by her body language, and it is very apparent that she is an emotionally intense person.
I love the symbolic language of this film, especially with use of the piano. She loved her piano, but towards the end of the film, once she came to terms with her satisfaction of life; she no longer needed the piano to release her emotions, and all that she had left unsaid. The piano was once her voice, but at the end of the film, she knew she could release her voice without the use of the piano.
In some ways, this situation relates to everyone's life because of the fact that we all seem to have an outlet for our emotions. Some people cry their emotions, some people sing their emotions, and some people excercize or write out their emotions. The piano is representative of our needs as humans to have some kind of outlet until we have reached our ultimate fantasies. However, Holly Hunter tought us to let go and release what we are hiding behind as people, and embrace our feelings by means of romance and love. This story is great because it is such a life lesson to everyone saying, "Let out your emotions through love, and don't hold back!"