The Audition is one of the most effective examples of a tight script and an even tighter edit that you could ever hope to see. We’re in deep in Piano Teacher territory, the highly strung violin teacher, Ana, played meticulously by Nina Hoss, seeking to channel her frustrations via the tutoring of a talented but fragile student. Unlike Haneke’s film, The Audition never veers towards sexual abuse, although there are two moments of physical intensity in their relationship which hint at the passion both have in common, a passion which finds its outlet in music. There’s a taut subtlety to the narrative which is constantly in play, something which is never flashy, a pot that simmers, threatening to boil over, finally reaching a heightened dramatic finale. The script weaves its multiple elements together effortlessly. One might say that the script is far from seamless - there are abundant seams. Ana has relationships of differing intensity with four different males (the student, her son, her husband and a cellist lover). She is also managing the demons of her own stress related abandonment of concert playing, a woman whose talent buckles in the fact of her temperament. The elements are many and varied, but the edit keeps the film moving at all times, with a suitably musical precision, scenes cut just at the point when their kinetic energy is sufficient to drive the next scene forwards. Hence even a scene as seemingly banal as Ana walking to work is inveighed with menace and meaning. The craftswomanship at work in the film, on every level, makes for an absorbing tale which never crosses the line into melodrama, no matter how close to the line it walks.
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