A simple premise that hits notes reminiscent of Hitchcock, Grand Piano is the best 'contained thriller' currently in theaters (also available on VOD).
Grand Piano, 80 minutes, director: Eugenio Mira, *** of 4 stars
The set up is simple – the execution even simpler yet
somehow Eugenio Mira’s Grand Piano delivers the goods in a contained thriller
that does an awful lot with very little. Efficiently the film introduces us to
our man, Tom Selznick (Elijah Wood) on a turbulent, white-knuckle flight to
Chicago where he anxiously deplanes in route to his first concert in
five-years, the subtly shifts from drama to thriller. As the piano prodigy
takes the stage, playing a piano built by his mentor, he finds a threat
scrawled in his sheet music and thus the film is off and running.
Often exhilarating this is a rare, smart contained thriller
providing a McGuffin that in actuality is useless – of course the brilliance of
Mira’s pacing is that in the moment we are caught off guard, unaware that the
entire plot is rather absurd. I was glued to my seat wondering exactly who is
in on the threat – despite the fact the film (spoiler alert) does play by a
narrowly defined set of rules. Non-Stop, another recent contained thriller by
comparison takes it notes from Clue – it can be either X, Y, and Z – here the
external threat isn’t a suspect list.
Tom is told to keep playing, act calm – if he misses a note
either he or his beautiful wife Emma (Kerry Bishe), who overnight has become a
movie star, will get it. The villain, Clem (John Cusack), is largely off
screen, the bulk of his dirty work carried out by his “assistant” played by,
yes, that Alex Winter lurking in the shadows of the theater.
Grand Piano largely depends upon behavior and character – in
the moment Tom excels, another strength of picture is the overall restraint and
limitations of the contained structure. Largely taking place in a packed
concert hall, the psychological drama is heightened by Tom’s Achilles’ heel –
his mentor’s masterpiece the mysterious, mythic unplayable La Cinquett.
For Wood’s part (and I’m no musical scholar) he rises to the
challenge, convincingly portraying this character with the psychological weight
required while director Mira has a good deal of fun playing a few notes from
another master, Alfred Hitchcock. As far as thrillers go, grounding this within
reality and resisting the urge to pump it up with action sequences and car
chases to “open it up” proves to be effective. Like the villain it plays within
a framework and by the rules – and the results are impressive. As far as
contained thrillers go, this is the best on in theaters currently. It’s a shame
that the film is only contained to a handful of theaters.
Grand Piano is also available widely on VOD including
iTunes.
