- For over sixty years, aged pianist Traude Kr ger has been teaching piano at the women's prison. But she's never met someone like Jenny, a convicted killer beating everything around her to a pulp just to amuse herself. But Jenny used to be a great musical talent. And she still is under her impenetrable facade. She could manage to win a prestigious piano contest she is allowed to participate
For over sixty years, aged pianist Traude Krüger has been teaching piano at the women s prison. But she s never met someone like Jenny, a convicted killer beating everything around her to a pulp just to amuse herself. But Jenny used to be a great musical talent. And she still is under her impenetrable facade. She could manage to win a prestigious piano contest she is allowed to participate in despite her prison sentence. However, a contest is no challenge to someone who wants life to stand still.
Four Mi! nutes recalls the lineage of films dedicated to marginalized characters who find solace in piano playing, such as Jane Campion’s
The Piano, yet there is more to this drama than the story of a woman yearning for autonomy. Jenny (Hannah Herzsprung), a prisoner described as the type to "steal a smoke from a corpse" by another inmate, is wasting away in a German penitentiary until she is recruited by piano teacher, Traude Krüger (Monica Bleibtrau), to train for a contest coming up. Krüger, who sees Jenny’s fingers keying organ music on her church pew in Sunday mass, realizes Jenny’s innate talent and slowly heals her student through music as well as through conversations revealing their mutually difficult pasts. While Jenny’s violent outbursts continuously disrupt her piano privileges, Traude heroically defends Jenny in meetings with the hard-edged warden, Mr. Meyerbeer (Stefan Kurt). The crux of the story lies in the friendship forged between these women t! hrough Traude’s determination to heal her young prodigy. Thr! ough fla shback, the viewer learns what male violence was inflicted upon each lady.
Four Minutes, subtitled from German, is a bit humorless, and one doesn’t glimpse even a slight smile on any character’s face until fifty minutes of film have rolled. Jenny’s outbursts at the piano as well, such as when she plays handcuffed to defy Meyerbeer, are overwrought. Still, the lack of sentimentality inherent to each character lends a wry realism to the intelligent script, such as when Ms. Krüger tells Jenny to stop playing "negro music," exposing her antiquated, uptight musical taste.
Four Minutes succeeds at illustrating a relationship in which two women cut from different cloth share commonalities that assume a female essence, though at their core they crave a universal desire for freedom. --
Trinie Dalton
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