MovieChat Forums > La pianiste (2001) Discussion > Did anyone else feel..........

Did anyone else feel..........

posted 16 years ago by evil_lawn_gnome
1 reply | jump to latest

that the final scene was direct symbolism for her giving up on life and walking out on everyone? The end of the movie was so shocking to me because there was so much left "unsaid" between the actions of each characters with all the events before. There isn't a sense of "closure" with any of the characters aside from the obvious indication that she lost him and that he did in fact take advantage of her. Yet, because she is incapable of expressing normal emotion she stabs herself to feel something again and then leaves the recital.

Now, the part I felt that followed pretty much said, "she's done" with everything and that she was on her way to kill herself. The only way to continue the story is if she decided to pursue it further but instead she walks out on the audience in the film, (the recital)and breaking the third wall she walks out on the audience of the film, (us). So, initially without her the story cannot continue and it ends abruptly. Does anyone else agree?

[–] angel-white 15 years ago

I cannot make sense of the last scene except to assume she meant to injure herself as she did with the razor in the bathtub, but then, upon seeing him at the recital, could not hold it off and wait for later. She had to do it then. But she could not go after that, bleeding, and complete the recital, so she just left.

This is probably not what the author or director intended, but this is the only thing that makes sense to me. Ignoring their intentions, I think that she had a need to make him into whoever abused her in the past (I assume her father based on the timeliness of his death being brought up), but then when she saw him, she could not contain herself, and had to injure herself right then, immediately, but then realized she could not continue with the recital at that point.

You can see this same line of rationale earlier in the film, in the letter she tells him what to do and says not to worry about her mother, that her mother is her problem. What does she think she will say to her mother? I think that she doesn't know, but she needs the abuse to happen so strongly that she is willing ot put it off until later, and figure it out then. Even if there is nothing she can think of to deal with that situation, it doesn't matter, she reserves that consideration until the time that she must deal with it. In the same regards, I think she needed to stab herself so strongly that she couldn't stop herself, but after it was done, she could think of no better action than to leave the recital.