Is Jane Campion an Auteur? Using Holy Smoke and The Piano

Both Holy Smoke and the piano are shocking films but neither is over shocking. In a world where the male often plays the strong role in films Jane Campion centres on the stronger female type focusing on politics and very raw sexuality.

Jane Campion uses similar roles for both the leading ladies Ruth Barron in Holy Smoke and Ada McGrath from The Piano. Ada is quiet due to the fact she hasn’t spoken since she was six years old but at the same time she comes across as a strong and loud individual. Ada will speak her mind whether it be physically or writing on a piece of paper. This is very much similar to the character Ruth played by Kate Winslet. Ruth will speak her mind and is not timid, throughout Holy Smoke Ruth is often shouting or cursing and letting her emotions show. Even when Harvey Keitel is trying to break Ruth and get into her mind she can’t help but let her emotions show, though she doesn’t want to be “cured”.

Harvey Keitel’s character in The Piano (George Baines) appears very ordinary apart from the fact that he has an Irish accent and Maori tattoos and is not Maori in origin. But George Baines is a simple man quietly spoken and comes across as kind. George helps out Ada at the beginning by agreeing to take her to the beach so she may play her piano. He also buys the piano with land off Ada’s husband but lets Ada play the piano at his house. Yet again sexual desires take over and George uses blackmail so he can perform sexual orientated acts but in turn let Ada play her piano. This leads to a love between George and Ada which in turn is a strange situation to fall in love from. This love only leads to devastation in the end and this is purely from sexual desires.

From these two films we can see a link forming where Jane Campion uses the same issues and the same character typing. Harvey Keitel is used in both films and plays characters which have a similar feel. Mostly being that this male character succumbs to sexual desire and this leads

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