THE PIANO TUNER OF EARTHQUAKES
UK, 2005, 99 minutes, Colour.
Amira Cassar, Gottfried John, Assumpta Serna.
Directed by Timothy and Stephen Quay.
The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes is an exotic and difficult film. It was written and directed by the Quay Brothers, an American set of twins, Timothy and Stephen Quay, who went to London Royal College of Art and made short films. They have remained in England after a return to the United States where they worked as book illustrators. They used puppets and miniature objects in the various short films, experimental films, music videos, set design for theatre, ballet and opera. Their first feature film was Institut Benjamenta, 1995, a combination of live action and animation.
These influences are clearly seen in The Piano Tuner. In one sense, the film is less of a movie than a video installation, a moving work of art that could be viewed as people walk through a museum rather than sit in a cinema watching a narrative unfold. There are all kinds of experimental designs, machines, varying grades of colour and lack of colour to give the film its unreal atmosphere. This is an extreme example of magic realism.
The plot is difficult to follow: it focuses on an opera star about to be married, her being murdered on stage. A doctor, Dr Droz, takes her corpse to his laboratory by the ocean. He is a maker of musical automata. He also employs a piano tuner to look after his objects. Also in the household is a seductive and maternal housekeeper. The piano tuner becomes entranced with his work, with the song that he hears – only to discover that it is the opera singer brought to life and the doctor’s intention is to have her sing in his diabolical opera. He falls in love with her – and the audience realises that he is the same actor who portrayed the opera singer’s fiance.
The film is unusual, beautiful to look at in its different kind of way. Amira Cassar (The Anatomy of Hell) is the opera singer, Gottfried John, a veteran of many films as a German character is the doctor and Spanish Assumpta Serna as the housekeeper.
The film can be appreciated as an avant garde experiment rather than as a film of entertainment.
