The Piano Teacher

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

La Pianiste (The Piano Teacher in English) is a 2001 erotic drama film directed by Michael Haneke, based on the novel Die Klavierspielerin by Nobel Prize-winner Elfriede Jelinek.

Erika (Isabelle Huppert) is a piano professor at a Vienna music conservatory, living with her overbearing bitch of a mother (Annie Girardot) whom she both loves and hates, whose father is in a mental institution, and who, despite her conservative exterior, harbors an unparalleled repressed masochistic sexual appetite inside her. This combination of factors has rendered her a bit on the irritable side, and she takes this out on her students by subjecting them to ruthless criticism. At a recital one night, Erika meets prospectless engineering student Walter (Benoît Magimel). Though it takes a long time, and despite the fact that by all appearances they cannot stand the sight of one another, the two eventually become romantically involved, behind Erika's mother's back. Walter is disgusted by her masochistic fantasies, and eventually attacks her. Fortunately for her, this is just what she wanted. The film ends with Erika stabbing herself and casually walking out of a gallery.

Not to be confused with Roman Polanski's The Pianist or Jane Campion's The Piano.

Tropes used in The Piano Teacher include: