The Piano Movie Review

"We can't leave the piano!" Anna Paquin's precociousness and grating voice may have turned a lot of people away from The Piano, but her Oscar a few months later redeemed her somewhat. Paquin has since grown up, but her debut film is unforgettable: The haunting tragedy-with-happy-ending of an 1800s-era mute woman essentially exiled to New Zealand with her emotionally dead husband. Jane Campion does her best directing ever, working a miracle out of the bizarre Harvey Keitel, with whom Holly Hunter's Ada falls in love. Forbidden romance on a deserted, cold, and rainy island? Sign me up.