Holly Hunter plays the role of Ada, a mute woman who is brought in New Zealand by her husband whom her father has arranged her into. Ada is very cold with her husband ever since he insisted to leave her favorite piano by the shore when they first came to the place. And it didn’t change everything especially when he decided to give it to George Baines for piano lessons with her. But everything didn’t turn right when she has learned to love him. So the story goes….

The film was basically centers on Ada, on who she is, what she does, and on how she struggles to follow her own will and heart, to be with the one she loves. The ending was not quite predictable though, I was surprised when Ada put her leg into the rope which is connected to the piano when they throw it in the middle of the ocean. But then, she freed herself. She freed her imprisonment when she decided to let go of the piano and live. But still, she dreams she is still part of that piano in the sea, she was, and always will.

The leit-motif in the film is the piano, the mud and forest. The piano was part of Ada’s life, also a representation of her muteness. She chose not to speak, and only the piano. When she has found love with George, she let go of the piano and offered everything to George. The same as when she let go of her muteness, when she has found a reason to live, she buried her muteness with the piano and started to learn how to speak. Her will to love him made her change and all the rest were buried in the ocean floor.

Also, her muteness made her the prisoner of her freedom to speak. It is a representation of herself being the prisoner of her father for making her marry the man she haven’t met before. She was a prisoner to her husband since she can’t do anything about it but follow what he wants even if it will made her forget and disregard her own will.

However, the mud and the forest became one of her everyday struggles. In comparison, it represents her struggles to win her piano back, that she must do whatever it takes to take it back from him. But at also at the last parts, when he has learned to love him, this mud and forest was her husband and his struggles with him to be with her beloved George.

At some point, the story would mean that: MEN are the head of the household, and women must be there to support the family, her husband before anything else, even before herself and her own interests. Some people would say that it does not apply now, but we know and it awfully shows in the society we are living the stereotype between men and women, and it really stricken the feminist in me. People say it does not, but it does, and it shows, and media are the ones who are taking most of the advantage. They show this to us like there is something wrong, that it is a rule that men are superior to women and at the same time letting us, the audiences, know the truth behind every lies. All of this exists, even if it wasn’t written in the book of rules.

In the end, Ada lets go of everything, and fights for what she think is right. This represent women in the society who can stand on their own, not being owned by anybody and has the power to choose their own will on things that they think best for them and the feelings, this makes them a woman. The strength of a real woman.