The Piano Teacher (2001) on Netflix
Erika Kohut, a piano teacher at a Vienna conservatory, lives with her domineering mother. Walter Klemmer, a young engineering student who plays piano, admires her and wants to become her pupil.
- Netflix2.9/5
- IMDb7.5/1082,926 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes74%
Trailer
Plot summary
Erika Kohut teaches piano at a Vienna conservatory and lives in an apartment with her elderly mother, who dominates her; her father spent years in a psychiatric asylum. She is lonely and sexually repressed, and her private life includes voyeurism, sadomasochism and self-harm. Walter Klemmer, a young engineering student who plays piano and admires her classical playing, meets her at a recital given by the Blonskijs. He applies to the conservatory to become her pupil, and though she votes against him, he joins her class. Another pupil, Anna Schober, is anxious and pushed by her ambitious mother.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Piano Teacher (2001)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Isabelle Huppert had already turned down Michael Haneke's Funny Games in 1997 over a professional conflict; he then told her he would not direct The Piano Teacher without her, and she read the screenplay and saw its potential.
- The Piano Teacher spent years in limbo: Elfriede Jelinek and Valie Export's screenplay was abandoned for lack of investment, and Paulus Manker held the rights but never secured a budget, so the producer asked Michael Haneke to direct.
SPOILER
In the bathtub scene where Erika cuts herself, tubes and a pump supplied the fake blood, which a props artist had to keep hidden under Isabelle Huppert and out of shot; Huppert wore a blood bag under her clothes for the self-stabbing scene.- Benoît Magimel studied piano during the shoot so his playing scenes would look convincing, although the music is playback; Susanne Lothar acted in German but her lines were dubbed into French for the French-Austrian co-production.
