Peppermint Friday Review #33: The Piano

I've been wanting to talk about this film for ages, because its a big film for me, as its the first film I ever watched that had sex scenes in. I remember watching it on the flight to New Zealand when I was 10 and I watched all the kids films, the family films, adventure films, sci-fi bascially everything I loved and I just thought 'I'll watch that'. Completely naive and it still remains one of the best period dramas I've ever seen in my opinion.

Its such an interesting story, its about a woman called Ada (played by Holly Hunter) and she hasn't spoken since she was 6 years old. She and her daughter Flora (played by Anna Paquin) are shipped of to New Zealand so Ada can marry a frontiersman called Alisdair (played by Sam Neill). As they arrive to New Zealand, Ada spends hours on her piano and that's the only thing she cares about. Alisdair has a friend Baines (played by Harvey Keitel) and he wants to learn how to play piano, at first Ada refuses and is disgusted by Baines, but Alisdair demands that she does. As time goes on Ada plays for him and Baines wants to 'do things to her' as she plays in exchange for keys on the piano, she agrees, and over time they fall in love.

One of the reasons as to why I love this film so much isn't to do with the fact that it has amazing costumes but its the story that's so unique and completely different from what I've seen before. Its one of those films I wish there was more of, I love that its set in New Zealand in the Victorian/Edwardian era because there's alot of Victorian and Edwardian films that are set in America and England, and its nice that it's set in New Zealand. I love anything to do with New Zealand because my mum's from New Zealand so this film holds such a special place for me. I love how the characters are unlike anyone I've ever seen before, Baines wasn't the typical handsome hero and neither was Alisdair they were very average looking. I love that Baines had tattoos on his face, like all the rest of the Maoris and Ada didn't speak both of them were the perfect couple. 

I love that with this film, it doesn't need to shout it and make it so blindingly obvious as to what's happening, what I mean by that is, it doesn't feel to the need to treat their audience like idiots sometimes films do that, they make things so loud and 'here it is wooo look they get together yay!!!' with the music. With this film they use music and the storyline very naturally and like a highlighter and not so in your face, especially with the romance of it all. Its great that with Ada she communicates by the piano and the piano is the main character in a way. Flora is fantastic, she was just so good, I love that they wrote her not being this good girl Victorian doll like child. She was written and played by a girl you would see now, and its no surprise to me that Anna Paquin won an Oscar for her part that year, because she was just incredible. 

The music of this film is just beautiful, it just geled so wonderfully with this film. This film is how to do music right and it made me want to learn the piano and play it. This film was written and directed by Jane Campion and she is so wonderful, and I need to watch more of her, because her way of storytelling is just so gorgeous. With the sex scenes they did it brilliantly again because it wasn't cheaply done in any way which is in my opinion how sex scenes in film should be done, by how the relationship is and the characters are, not just 'oh let's just do it!'. This film is one of my favourite period dramas and its such an underrated film, and Jane Campion is such an underrated director. I feel people only talk about her because she's a female director I've said this before, she's not a good female director,  she s a good director, don't put the female in front. 

This film is well worth watching as its so wonderful and unique with its story and characters and music, costume just everything its so good. I haven't found another film like this yet, even if you arn't a fan of period drama romances, you'll still love this as its not too lovey dovey. But still remaining the truth of the story and the characters, definitely give it a watch!

Review: Taxi Driver

Whenever I think of top directors and they're films, its usually Martin Scorsese for Taxi Driver. Its a very I feel an adult film not in that way, just with the violence, swearing and minor flirty sex scenes with Jodie Foster in her first proper role playing a prostitute, Robert DeNiro playing this lonely almost insane Taxi Driver, you can tell this film is not a happy go lucky type of film. 

I think everyone knows this film, but I just wanna talk about it as I love it so much and I think its my favorite Martin Scorsese film. The film is about this man called Travis Bickle played by Robert DeNiro who is discharged marine, he is lonely lives in New York and takes up a job as a Taxi Driver to help him cope with his insomnia. He meets various people during his job, like Betsy who he ends up going on a date with, Iris or 'Easy' the child prostitute played by Jodie Foster, who is trying to escape her pimp Matthew 'Sport' played by Harvey Keitel. 

This film is a hard film to watch, I say that as I actually watched it twice, once when I was about 15 and again a few months ago. The first time I watched it I thought 'yeah okay whatever' and I don't know why I watched it again but I'm glad I did, as I probably watched it wrong the first time, and I know that sounds so bad and I hate it when people say 'oh you didn't watch it right' because how can you watch something wrong? But I guess I was 15 so I didn't understand it as such but now I like it. Which proves that if you don't like something the first time, doesn't mean you'll still feel that way the second time. 

 Jodie Foster was fantastic in this film, I heard many rumours that she had to see a Shrink before she was aloud to be in this film, but regardless if they're true or not. She is such a stand out in this role, she carries it like an actress, a true actress not a child actress and it's fairly obvious from this performance she was gonna be a big star. Robert De Niro and Harvey Keitel are both brilliant in this film, I mean they can do no wrong its an iconic film with iconic actors who say the dialogue how it should be said. 

One thing that I love about this film is the costumes, I adore the New York Fashion from the 70's its so casual and yet so dressy and its even trying to hard to look good. The 70's in terms of films were I feel anyway, quite a difficult year to watch, as you will hardly get a silly fun comedy to watch, It was all about the anti-heros and really hard hitting storylines and dialogue that wasn't used that much, like swearing I don't think many writers would put swearing in they're scripts until the 70s and this film does make me think of the 70's in fashion and filmmaking. 

Robert De Niro portrayed a man on what I believe to be an emotional breakdown. He does it so effortlessly its natural, as an audience you get worried for this man's health and well being which is great. I like that with this film its a main character who is internally good but can be a bit crazy especially in the end, its good I feel to have the main being good and also bad, as that can be relatable I guess. Its also nice to watch a character who is unlike anyone and you can't relate at all and you're away from the world and sucked into another world, a world you can't relate to. 

Overall this is such a fantastic film, its 70s I feel through and through. Its Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro and young Jodie Foster. I mean you can't go wrong its just an iconic classic film, that every needs to watch. I will talk to you all on Wednesday for a special post largely focusing on directors and they're classic films.