Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum What is your favorite piano movie?

Agree, Immortal Beloved is great. I also have mixed feelings about Impromptu. I should be incredibly grateful to that movie though since it inadvertently it led me back to Chopin. I'd rented it because I'm partial to Julian Sands (Liszt) and my nickname in college was "George Sand." (I'd never been into her or anything. I just lived in a language hall with a lot of French students and they came up with the nickname. I'm a dark brunette, a scribbler, and was at the time even more inclined to dress like a guy than I am now. Skirt? Do I OWN a skirt?) I thought the movie was "OK" but I remembered that affair had ended in tears, not all sweetness and light as in the movie so I had to check my facts. That led me to Chopin's letters. Turns out we share the same neuroses, sense of humor, astrological sign and weak chest. And the rest is history - - - -

Ironically, my daughter cannot stand Chopin (too dissonant). She once asked me, "can't you play some music from Immortal Beloved?" (Sorry kid, no orchestra.)

Chopin, Desire for Love isn't a bad movie. It's a bit melodramatic and all from Sand's side with a lot of misinformation but there are some great piano scenes and it's beautifully photographed. Filmed on site in Majorca for one thing. My favorite scene in that movie is when a very young Chopin, newly in Paris get a "piano lesson" from a publisher after he rejects Chopin's compositions. "Don't you know what a piano is for?" the publisher asks sarcastically, and then tinkles off some pretty prissy little ditty and Chopin holds his peace but looks like he can't decide whether to deck the patronizing *** or barf. There's also a very effective but historically inaccurate "music video" of the Revolutionary Etude thundering while Russian soldiers smash in the clavier of Chopin's childhood piano with the butts of their rifles and then burn it. That happened but not until 1866.

the Competition.. Richard Dreyfus

"An American in Paris" ... Concert pianist Oscar Lavant playing Gershwin's "Piano Concerto in F".

i have several...really almost EVERY movie having ANYTHING to do with the piano or the great master composers.

the first one, it introduced me to classical music, believe it or not, was fantasia. i was spellbound by the beauty of that magnificent music...beethoven, schubert, tchaikovsky, bach, stravinsky. i've been 'hooked' ever since.

Madame Sousatzka...super, especially the ending.

a song to remember...a bio of chopin's life. not much truth to it, but the music was the star. i especially liked it because almost every composition (and there were a lot of them) played was finished...to the end. boy, do i hate when they'll start a famous piece and then cut it after a minute.

to be honest, i didn't have the stomach to watch the pianist when it first came out. i did rent it later on, and while it was painful to watch, it was also a tribute to the human spirit.

i thought amadeus was weird. was mozart really that nutty? i read recently that his father had him until his thumb from the age of 4 until his early 20's. so when mozart was finally free to act on his own, he acted as a child because he never really had a childhood. he was irresponsible and lived beyond his means and in a dream word. a genius...absolutely. i actually sobbed at the end when they threw his body in that open pit of other corpses and then threw salt all over it...to cover the smell. how tragic.

immortal beloved...i loved it, each and every part. and the music, throughout, was, again, the star.

the competition was great...but they could have left out the romance and put in more music.

there are many others, but i'm sure you're bored by now.

kathleen

Yeah, he was that nutty. Kathleen's description makes him sound a lot like Michael Jackson. I never saw
the correlation until now.

I agree. I enjoyed this movie alot. this is the only movie i've seen out of all the movies everyone has listed (except Charlie Brown Christmas). I've been looking for more piano based movies this is definantly helping out. now if i can just find them somewhere! Anyone think Blockbuster would have them? I got Amadeus from my local library. I just looked on their website and they have "The Pianist" .

No not bored at all i've been looking for piano based movies i've written a list of all the movies posted.I did see Amadues and watched the special feautures they said that they added more drama to it and they exagerated some of the facts. But i think that alot was true just with exageration.

Most people don't know this but Mozart was probably the best billiards player in Vienna. (This was a skill George Sand tried to teach Chopin with very limited success. Apparently he kept dropping cues.)

My favourite piano(ish) film, would have to be "The Beat That My Heart Skipped"... Although I'd have preferred it if the piano took a slightly more promninant role, it's still an excellent film, and I'd reccommend it.

I like the "Amadeus" and so does my daughter, so we have seen it a couple of times.
My favourite scene is the one where Mozart on his death-bed is instructing Salieri how to write the music to "Confutatis Maledictis".
In my history-book it is not Salieri but a student named Sussmayer who finishes Mozarts Requiem, but the story is good even if its pure fiction.

It might be true that Mozart was a little "nuts", but his music is divine !

Ragnhild

My favorite piano movie of recent is The Legend of 1900, with Tim Roth.

I also enjoyed Amadeus on Broadway (many years ago) and the movies.

~~Sharon

Hey remember Groundhog Day? Not a piano movie but there was the great part when Bill Murray living the one day over and over takes piano lessons so that in the end it appears he has learned to be this great pianist over night.

Hey Peyton, that's probably most every pianist dream (deep down) - to impress - how did they learn to play like that!!! Kewl! (Play to impress yourself and you are sure to impress your audience). WOOT!

I've just read a review of a new film about pianos - it is called "The Page Turner". I think it's French. It is about a young girl who is a talented pianist who enters a competition, where a woman judge treats her badly. Later on when she becomes the judge's page-turner she gets her revenge...

Has anyone seen it? I'm going to find out if it's on in London maybe.

Best wishes, Mary-Rose

"5 Easy Pieces."

How about "Song Without End" the story of Franz Liszt starring Dirk Bogarde and Capucine (an actress who later committed suicide).

What about the Eddie Duchin Story staring Tyrone Power and Kim Novak.

"The Competition" with Richard Dryfus and Amy Irving was also very good.

It's certainly not a piano movie ... but I was highly amused by one scene in the recent "Poseidon." It's a remake of the 1970s disaster flick in which a cruise ship is capsized by a giant wave. Among other unlikely scenarios that follow, a boy ends up trapped on a piano hanging from the ceiling .

I laughed my socks off at first but then I thought, hey, I wonder if they really do bolt pianos to the floor on cruise ships? If the ships rolls hard in a storm, I sure wouldn't want a big old grand circumnavigating the ballroom all on its own. Not that there's any chance the bolts would hold once the room went upside-down, or even that the body of the instrument would stay attached to the legs ... but, seriously, would there ever be a time to bolt a piano to the floor?

FYI, yes, I checked. It's a Baldwin.

JerryG,

The Eddie Duchin Story was my vote in a similar thread over in the Piano Forum earlier this year. Carmen Cavallero did the actual playing in that movie.

Anyone ever heard of the movie "Opus 11"
Good movie
About a blind kid and a high school band more than piano.

I would like the movie "Ray" is it had less sex and more music...

but im 13, and what do i know... :rolleyes:

Another Rocky Horror fan here.

Lisztomania !! Perhaps not the best piano movie, actually its fairly crumby, but highly recommended for its sheer novelty value. Has anyone seen the movie Lisztomania? This movie is difficult to find; it was an indie film made sometime in the mid 70s, therefore you will be luckly if you see it in a blockbuster. This is by no means a historical film, but just a comedic spin on a few composers. Notable aspects in the movie include our protangonist, Liszt, and a Pope, who is played by former Beatles drummer Ringo Starr. There are many hiliarious episodes, but since its been so long when I last saw it, I can't really elaborate. But yea, worth one viewing.