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The Piano (1993)
The Piano is a 1993 historical romance film written and directed by Jane Campion. It stars Holly Hunter, Harvey Keitel, Sam Neill, and Anna Paquin in her first major acting role. The film focuses on a mute Scottish woman who travels to a remote part of New Zealand with her young daughter after her arranged marriage to a settler. The plot has similarities to Jane Mander's 1920 novel, The Story of a New Zealand…
Directed by Jane Campion · Shot by Stuart Dryburgh · Cut by Veronika Jenet · Music by Michael Nyman · 120 min
How it was made
- Holly Hunter worked with sign-language instructor Darlene Allen Wittman to build an amalgamated sign language for her mute character Ada, blending American, British, Russian and Indigenous signs.
- Hunter took piano lessons so she could authentically play the compositions Michael Nyman wrote for the film.
- Anna Paquin won the role of Flora over more than 5,000 other girls at open auditions, with casting focused on finding girls small enough to be believable as the daughter of the relatively short Hunter.
- Composer Michael Nyman based the film's main theme, The Heart Asks Pleasure First, on the traditional Scottish song Gloomy Winter's Noo Awa'.
- The beach and abandoned-piano scenes were filmed at Karekare Beach west of Auckland, with bush scenes shot near Matakana and Awakino and underwater scenes at the Bay of Islands.
Behind the scenes
Elsewhere
More by Jane Campion
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