The Piano Teacher
Haneke's adaptation of a novel by Elfriede Jelinek may be shot, edited and performed rather more conventionally than most of his work, but in many ways it's no less confrontational or transgressive than, say, The Seventh Continent or Funny Games . If the latter was a chaste but provocative variation on the violent thriller, this puts the porn movie through much the same paces, refusing to provide explicit titillation even as it explores the psychopathology of a professor of music, touching 40 but still so oppressed by her tyrannical mother, with whom she still lives, and by the disciplines of her vocation, that her only acquaintance with emotion and eroticism comes from watching porn. Then, into her sad life comes a young student, who falls for her. No conventional redemption ensues, as the pair slide slowly but inexorably into a relationship so painfully twisted it would be implausible, were it not for Haneke's rigorous intelligence and Huppert's controlled and courageous performance. Ambitious, profoundly articulate, and despite its avoidance of sentimentality and sermonising, very compassionate.
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Time Out
03-06-2025
- Time Out
The Piano Teacher
Haneke's adaptation of a novel by Elfriede Jelinek may be shot, edited and performed rather more conventionally than most of his work, but in many ways it's no less confrontational or transgressive than, say, The Seventh Continent or Funny Games . If the latter was a chaste but provocative variation on the violent thriller, this puts the porn movie through much the same paces, refusing to provide explicit titillation even as it explores the psychopathology of a professor of music, touching 40 but still so oppressed by her tyrannical mother, with whom she still lives, and by the disciplines of her vocation, that her only acquaintance with emotion and eroticism comes from watching porn. Then, into her sad life comes a young student, who falls for her. No conventional redemption ensues, as the pair slide slowly but inexorably into a relationship so painfully twisted it would be implausible, were it not for Haneke's rigorous intelligence and Huppert's controlled and courageous performance. Ambitious, profoundly articulate, and despite its avoidance of sentimentality and sermonising, very compassionate.
The Guardian
27-03-2025
- The Guardian
Rafał Zajko: The Spin Off – fantastical sci-fi visions with a side order of pickles
There's a lot of art about birth, death and rebirth, but not a lot of it uses pickles. Preserves, however, are all over Polish artist Rafał Zajko's biggest solo show yet. Big jars of brine filled with salty cucumbers and little figurines in the shape of cryogenic preservation chambers. That combination of the fantastically sci-fi and the mundanely everyday is Zajko's hallmark. The young London-based artist has spent the past few years showing ceramic and concrete sculptures filled with flights of cybernetic romanticism and nods to vaping, baking and pickling. In The Spin Off, as this show at Focal Point Gallery in Southend is called, he has gone on a deep dive into a vast mess of ideas about longevity and rebirth. The centre of the space is dominated by an ovoid floor sculpture that gets moved and reshaped throughout the week. Laid across its surface, ceramic tiles are assembled to look like a map of planetary systems or control panels for alien spaceships, covered in incomprehensible knobs, buttons and displays. Circular sections of it can be lifted out and replaced with items from the cabinets on the wall: little concrete eggs, ceramic kaiser rolls, jars of pickles. Eggs are everywhere. They're in vitrines cut into benches around the space. They're formed into huge uncomfortable stools in the middle of the gallery (a nod to designer Philippe Starck's iconic but useless lemon squeezer). They're nestled in reliefs on the wall that look like maps of future cities. They're symbols of rebirth, of perseverance and survival. In the other main gallery space, a huge red eye in a vast plastic bubble blinks at you and flashes lasers as it burps out an endless cloud of vape smoke, a polluted miasma of surveillance state aesthetics, as if Zajko is asking what the point of living forever is if you're going to be watched the whole time. Lining the walls between the galleries, Zajko has painted frescoes of eggs and those Philippe Starck juicers, surrounding a huge relief of grey humanoid bodies studded with pink chewing gum. Vitrines are filled with architectural sculptures made of upcycled church candles. The whole thing is caked in references to pop culture (each work is named after a film that's had at least one remake, A Star is Born, Funny Games, Cruel Intentions), art and design history, Polish mythology, and on and on. It feels overthought and under-edited. It's so excited by its own endless references that the story of the work gets a little lost in the process. Sign up to Art Weekly Your weekly art world round-up, sketching out all the biggest stories, scandals and exhibitions after newsletter promotion That's a shame because, first of all, the aesthetic is great. Zajko is unique: it's like a pastel-coloured Alien; a gentle, cotton candy take on sci-fi horror; a 1990s McDonald's designed by a xenomorph; a Mattel Metropolis. It's attractive, alluring, you want to touch all of it, get lost in it. The main thrust of the show, the primary idea, is brilliant. It's so full of the fear of death and anxiety about the future: this is the art of a mind buzzing with apprehension about what's next and trying desperately to hold on to some sense of self. Yet this esoteric sci-fi and heavy theorising is rooted in the everyday – thanks to those bread rolls and pickles. It gives everything a sense of joy and humour, a link to the past, to reality. Living forever, seeing what the future holds, may be terrifying, but at least there'll be pickles.
The Independent
01-11-2024
- The Independent
17 horror movies that will actually scare you
You're probably on the hunt to watch some frightening films to extend the Halloween celebrations. Mastering a scare is something that only the most gifted of directors can manage – and there are a lot of films out there that fall very short when trying to terrify their audience. Those that do deliver, though, succeed with aplomb: John Carpenter, George Romero and Get Out director Jordan Peele to name but a few. For those wanting to be genuinely scared, it can be quite hard to find a film that suits your need, but fret no more – we've compiled the scariest horror films on offer, ranging from German Expressionist films from the 1920s to indie smash hit Hereditary. Below, we run through 17 horror films that will genuinely scare you. The Amityville Horror (1979) The Amityville Horror is based on the true story of the Lutzes, a family who were run out of their home after being terrorised by paranormal phenomena in 1975. Just one year before, Ronald DeFeo Jr shot and killed six members of his family in the same house. James Brolin and Margot Kidder lead this film, which became one of the biggest hits of 1979. Audition (1999) Japanese horror Audition follows a widower who meets a woman named Ayoma after staging auditions to meet a potential new partner. Soon, though, her dark past begins to surface, which equates to a pretty disturbing climax. The Blair Witch Project (1999) Although parodied to death, The Blair Witch Project popularised the found-footage format to terrifying degrees in 1999. People genuinely believed they were watching real clips of three student filmmakers being terrorised by a Maryland legend known as the Blair Witch. The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (1920) Black-and-white silent horror film The Cabinet of Dr Caligari is considered the quintessential work of German Expressionism, but also one of the scariest films in cinema history. It follows a hypnotist (Werner Krauss) who uses a somnambulist to commit murders, and Wiene's shadowed sets and striking visual style combine to unsettle the viewer in ways most filmmakers only dream of managing. Funny Games (1997) Funny Games places the horror in the familiar setting of home. It follows two young men who hold a family hostage and torture them with sadistic games. The result is far scarier than anything featuring ghosts, witches or demons. Hereditary (2018) Proving that horror is a force to be reckoned with, Hereditary became independent distributor A24's highest-grossing film around the world upon its release in 2018. It tells the story of a family who find themselves haunted after the death of their secretive grandmother and features a final act that left many of its viewers with sleepless nights. Watch Apple TV+ free for 7 days New subscribers only. £8.99/mo. after free trial. Plan auto-renews until cancelled It (1986) Forget the effects-laden remake – this version of It, released as a miniseries in 1986, is the most terrifying adaptation of Stephen King's beloved novel to date. It follows a shapeshifting demon who takes the form of a sadistic child-killing clown named Pennywise (Tim Curry). Lake Mungo (2008) Taking the form of a mockumentary, the little-seen Australian drama Lake Mungo may have received a limited release in 2008, but its story of a family attempting to come to terms with the drowning of their daughter stays with viewers long after. The Orphanage (2007) Produced by Guillermo del Toro, this acclaimed 2007 chiller follows the disappearance of a young boy in an orphanage, which brings many of the building's terrifying secrets to the fore. Paranormal Activity (2009) Could Paranormal Activity be the scariest film of all time? It's certainly one of them. Just when you thought found-footage had had its day, Oren Peli's small-budgeted festival favourite became one of 2009's biggest hits. Audiences lapped up the story of a couple who capture supernatural presences on a camera in their own home. Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) Paranormal Activity 3 earns its place on this list for its final 10 minutes. Set 18 years prior to the events of the first two films, we see the cause of the curse that follows characters Katie and Kristi for the rest of their lives – and it's down to a coven of witches led by their grandmother. [REC] (2007) Played out in real-time, the claustrophobic Spanish horror film [REC] is one of the better examples of found-footage cinema. Released in 2007, it follows a reporter and her cameraman who follow firefighters to a Barcelona building and soon find themselves locked inside with its occupants who are displaying murderous behaviour. Ring (1998) Unless you've been living under a rock, you know the story of Ring by now: viewers of a cursed videotape die seven days after watching it. While the inevitable Hollywood remake in 2002 was better than it had any right to be, Nakata's original is as terrifying as horror films come. Sinister (2012) Of all the Blumhouse horror films, 2012 release Sinister – which features the demonic character Bughuul – is the spookiest of them all. It stars Ethan Hawke as a true-crime writer who discovers a box of home movies depicting grisly murders in the attic of his new house. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) The fictional Texas Chainsaw Massacre, marketed as a true story, follows a group of cannibals – including Leatherface – who relentlessly hunt down a group of friends. Not only is Tobe Hooper's film one of the most striking horror experiences, but one of the greatest of all time, too The Wicker Man (1973) The Wicker Man is deemed the best British horror film of all time for a reason. It tells the story of a Police Sergeant who travels to an isolated island in search of a missing girl, only to find its inhabitants practising a form of Celtic paganism. The Witch (2015) For the most part, it's not what you see in The Witch that terrifies, it's what you don't see. Eggers unsettlingly holds his camera a fraction too long in places as he retells the story of a Separatist family who encounter supernatural forces in the woods beyond their farm.
