Only the piano does not lie

Geniuses often have unusual features. In The Life Apart, the main character has a large birthmark on his face.

Beatrice Barison (as Rebecca) and Sonia Bergamasco (as the aunt) in The Life Apart - Photo: Producer

Rebecca has a natural talent for playing the piano. She is talented but not a genius. Her story is not the extraordinary story of a little Mozart or a little Chopin, using extraordinary music to overcome extraordinary suffering.

Her shame, her brokenness, her fear are not romanticized like that. And neither is her music.

Born into an upper-class family in the 1980s, with a talented doctor father and a talented pianist aunt, Rebecca had a large red birthmark. Her mother was depressed because of it. She didn't want to hold her, didn't want to take her out, didn't even want her to go to school, didn't want her to practice piano.

The life apart trailer

One night, her mother jumped to her death. From then on, Rebecca often dreamed of her mother. Her dreams and her mother's diary led her to dark family secrets, secrets that in the end we are not sure if they are real or imaginary.

Rebecca's only true friend is the piano: when she's happy, curious, angry, sad, and doubtful, Rebecca plays. The film's brilliance is in contrast to the ambiguity of the people.

People always have secrets: Did her father have an affair? Was her aunt really the "monster" her mother described? What really caused her mother to commit suicide? Did her closest girlfriend hate her father so much that she killed him when she was only 11 years old?

The Life Apart recorded music live on set

It's hard to know the truth about people. They still appear to love and care for Rebecca, but there are so many things we don't know about them.

Rebecca herself is full of mystery. Is the birthmark on her face, like the pig's tail in One Hundred Years of Solitude, evidence of family taint? Only her songs have no secrets. They are the truest expression.

The two main actors are Beatrice Barison (as Rebecca) and Sonia Bergamasco (as the aunt). So it is no surprise that all the piano playing scenes in The Life Apart were performed and recorded live on set by the actors themselves.

The Life Apart does not have the stunning, ecstatic, or choking piano performances found in many other works with similar themes about pianists.

The film does not dramatize the musical scenes, nor does it place any musical scene as the climax of emotion.

The music teacher compliments Rebecca by saying that she is proof that the only way to be great is to practice, practice, and practice some more. And we see that the music in the film mostly happens in practice rooms rather than live performances.

After all, it is the exercises, not the performances, that are the daily events in an artist's world.

And it is in the exercises that we see the diligence of a person. Just like life, in the most trivial slices is where we see the resilience to continue living despite the injuries.

In addition to standard classical repertoire scores, they also play compositions by contemporary composer Dario Marianelli written especially for the film.

Marianelli, the Oscar-winning composer of Atonement, once again shows that he understands better than anyone the subtlest ups and downs, the pebbles that constantly churn in a young woman's soul.

Hien Trang

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/chi-duong-cam-khong-noi-doi-20251012100147344.htm