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Armin Mueller-Stahl, Noah Taylor, Geoffrey Rush, Lynn Redgrave, John Gielgud ... see more see more... , Googie Withers , Nicholas Bell , Randall Berger , Robert Hands , Chris Haywood , Edwin Hodgeman , Paul Linkson , John Martin , Brenton Whittle , Mark Warren , John Cousins , Phyllis Burford , Daphne Grey , Mark Lawrence , Sonia Todd , Alex Rafalowicz , David L. King , Neil Thomson , Joey Kennedy

The true story of a gifted Australian piano prodigy, this biographical drama was nominated for seven Oscars, with actor Geoffrey Rush winning for Best Actor. Rush stars as David Helfgott, a pianist wi... read more read more...th a history of mental problems. As a fragile boy genius at math, chess, and piano, David is driven hard by his overbearing father (Armin Mueller-Stahl), a tyrant who forbids him to accept a scholarship offered by the great violinist Isaac Stern. Although he studies briefly in London under tutor Cecil Parks (John Gielgud), David has a nervous breakdown after performing Rachmaninoff's daunting "Piano Concerto No. 3" (known as the "Rach 3"). Years later, the adult David keeps up a steady patter of nervous stammering at all times and has been reduced to playing in a bar. Through a friend, he meets astrologer Gillian (Lynn Redgrave), and falls in love with her. With Gillian's help, David embarks down the road to regained fame and mastery of the "Rach 3." The international popularity of Shine caused a sensation leading to a musical tour for Helfgott, whose performances were less adroit than many audiences expected, sparking criticism that writer-director Scott Hicks had exaggerated his subject's talent for dramatic purposes. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi

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33 critics

PG-13, 1 hr. 45 min.

Directed by: Scott Hicks

Release Date: November 20, 1996

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DVD Release Date: July 15, 1997

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Flixster Reviews (1,297)

  • moonrivers
    June 13, 2011
    moonrivers
    Famous bio-pic is indeed well done and engaging as we follow a young piano prodigy from his formative years to modern day, with the emphasis on his manic relationship with his father. In typical Hollywood fashion, while Rush won Best Oscar for his fragile portrayal of a wounded ... read moreartist, the film is actually carried by Armin Mueller-Stahl whose work as the "tyrannical father" sails way past convention to reveal a complex picture of an artist himself denied. This is the film George Lucas meant for "Phantom Menace".
  • hobster1
    February 27, 2011
    hobster1
    Bittersweet biography dealing with Australian concert pianist David Helfgott who suffered from mental illness. Most of the film concerns his formative years as a musical prodigy. He escapes the tyrannical rule of his father who disowns him after he departs for London upon being... read more offered a scholarship to the Royal College of Music. Armin Mueller-Stahl makes an indelible impression as his domineering father in a truly unsympathetic portrayal. Helfgott's ongoing obsession with executing Rachmaninoff's technically demanding Piano Concerto No. 3 ultimately reaches an exhilarating manic apex. The narrative is a bit murky when it comes to Helfgott's subsequent psychological breakdown. Are his problems caused by the virtually unplayable composition or the result of physical and mental abuse by his father? It's never quite clear, but regardless, the scene that highlights the performance of this piece is a beautifully edited sequence of talent and dementia. Geoffrey Rush won the Best Actor Oscar for his work in the role of the virtuoso as an adult, but Noah Taylor actually registers much more screen time with his sensitive depiction as the adolescent David.
  • mumby1988
    November 18, 2010
    mumby1988
    Few words fill a critic with such dread as "the triumph of the human spirit". There have been legions of films about individuals coming through against all odds, and for every time a director gets it right (The Elephant Man, Ed Wood, The Madness of King George), we get a gross of... read more self-important, 'worthy' films, whose attempts at genuine emotional engagement fall desperately short of the mark. Shine is one of the better examples of this genre, containing a number of good performances and attempting to explore some interesting ideas. But it is not a complete success and fourteen years after its Oscar glory, its flaws are plain to see.

    For its first forty-five minutes, Shine is a well-made, technically accomplished biopic of piano prodigy David Helfgott which manages to get to grips with some of the issues which resulted from such an extraordinary amount of talent. We are given a father-son relationship which on the surface seems straightforward, but which is actually more nuanced than first appears. In the initial scenes between Noah Taylor and Armin Mueller-Stahl, it feels like a standard proud father or pushy parent relationship. But as the drama unfolds we begin to understand the father's own conflicts surrounding music and the pressures surrounding both characters.

    Both father and son are essentially reacting to the extraordinary talent bequeathed to David. David's response is initially to obey his father, both by winning competitions and by practising to be as good as he can. The father's response is oppressive, at least to us, but it is motivated both by regret of his own missed opportunities and by a desire for David to be "a winner". On a couple of occasions he mentions how he saved up to buy a violin, only for his own father to smash it in front of him. Mueller-Stahl is conflicted by the desire to avoid that mistake, but at the same time a genetic desire to control his son. Hence he encourages him to play but refuses to pay for outside lessons or to allow David to go to America.

    Several reviews of Shine have pointed out the factual inaccuracies in this portrayal, claiming that Helfgott's upbringing was nowhere near as oppressive as the film depicts. While the film may be guilty of telling the 'Hollywood version' of events, it just about gets away with it at the start because the ideas it is exploring are both interesting dramatically and pertinent to the character. As in The Elephant Man and Ed Wood, it doesn't always matter that the facts aren't completely in order, so long as the events are cohesive with the artistic intentions of the writer and director.

    Shine explores the idea that music is all-pervasive: it surrounds and influences every human action, whether it is celebrated as high art or dismissed as base cacophony. It also manages to make highbrow classical music incredibly interesting, even to those of us who couldn't care less about Rachmaninoff. Sir John Gielgud's flowery speeches as he describes the conflicts in "the Rach Three" are indicative of a batch of characters who are utterly in love not just with individual pieces but the whole concept of music. This is echoed in Scott Hicks' direction; during Noah Taylor's performance, he shoots the piano and Taylor's hands from every conceivable angle, both to show the actor is actually playing the music and to get us caught up in the invisible battle between the notes.

    Such decisions, however, are the beginning of a number of problems which eventually hobble the movie. Having gone to so much trouble to replicate the music on film (right down to Geoffrey Rush acting as his own hand double) Hicks spoils it all by resorting to clichéd slow motion during the pivotal performance. We end up being impressed by Taylor's recital and the level of physical exertion, but slowing down the film to show his hair being bathed in sweat is simply unnecessary. Such a device takes all the momentum out of the music, and after this sequence the film never really recovers.

    Melodrama in itself is not a bad thing, but Shine is guilty of a number of unnecessary concessions towards it, either in a plea for sympathy or as a means of moving the plot forward. There are a number of plot holes which are slightly troubling when trying to piece the film together. For instance, David Helfgott arrives at the Royal College of Music in London straight after walking out on his family: how did he get the money for the trip, or a passport for that matter?

    In the second half of the film, after Taylor has disappeared from our screens, the plot begins to barrel along at a breakneck pace so that we miss out on a lot of potentially interesting scene. To some extent this is understandable, since Hicks' probably didn't have the money to cast a multitude of different actors to play Helfgott as he aged over a period of ten years. Nonetheless the film feels hurried and begins to lose sight of its thematic intentions. One could argue that Hicks is attempting to tell the story as Helfgott would: fast-talking, jabbering and unable to focus on anything for too long. But this theory doesn't hold much water when you consider the viewpoint of Hicks' camera, which only shows David's POV on a select few occasions.

    Even more problematic than this is the film's tendency in his second half to resort to biopic clichés, as if the filmmakers were deliberately positioning it for awards. Being a film about the triumph of the human spirit, we know that our protagonist is going to come to terms with their difficulties and everything will be happily resolved. But the pandering to convention extends further than just the plot outline. Geoffrey Rush, who is a talented actor, plays the adult Helfgott as essentially a holy fool, borrowing heavily from Dustin Hoffman's performance in Rain Man.

    The film is at heart an actors' romp, with only Taylor coming through with the goods and giving a genuinely brilliant performance. Rush is okay, but both he and Lynn Redgrave are tuned to a high setting, with arms and big emotions flying all over the place in an increasingly irritating manner. Mueller-Stahl mumbles his way through in a decent but unremarkable performance, and Gielgud is clearly enjoying himself as David's tutor, who can no longer play the piano because of a stroke. It's not a million miles from his performance in The Elephant Man, albeit with a little more pomp and a lot less gravitas.

    The only other real surprise with Shine is the amount of nudity. The film is a 12 certificate, and therefore we don't get anything that could be called 'full-frontal'. But several sequences involving nudity seem to come almost out of nowhere with little or no bearing on the plot. There are several shots of Helfgott, played by both Taylor and Rush, wearing nothing from the waist down, including a bizarre sequence of Rush bouncing on a trampoline in nothing but a pair of headphones and a tatty overcoat. Oddest of all is the scene where two rebellious pupils take David to a club, at which point the camera cuts to near-naked dancers and Marc Warren as a drag queen. Scenes like this are not exploitative, but they aren't exactly central to the plot.

    In the grand scheme of films about the triumph of the human spirit, Shine does better than most but comes nowhere near the likes of Ed Wood or The Madness of King George. As an examination of mental illness it is neither as compelling nor as heartbreaking as A Beautiful Mind, and even when taken as a full-on melodrama, it is a lot less satisfying than Intermezzo, let alone The Red Shoes. It's worth seeing for the central performances and a number of visual touches which prevent it from slipping into the realm of TV movies. But it has precious little else to stand on, and is further proof that the Academy should not always, if ever, be taken at its word.
  • FrizzDrop
    November 13, 2010
    FrizzDrop
    Eccentric, tempid, heartbreaking. Shine is all of these, yet none. Hidden meanings are encoded in every statement, every gesture, until there's only laughter and joy. Geoffrey Rush, one of the best actors working today, delivers a performance worth watching undoubtedly.
  • fb619846742
    October 19, 2009
    fb619846742
    A triumphant movie concerning the life of a gifted pianist and his failed relationship with his verbally abusive father. Geoffrey Rush's extraordinary performance carries this movie, this is a great film.
  • SirPant
    September 29, 2009
    SirPant
    Excellent biography of David Helfgott, Geoffrey Rush at his very best!
  • binky013
    July 31, 2009
    binky013
    It's taken a few beers--uh, I mean a few days--for me to figure out what exactly I want to say about this movie. The first thing I'd like to say -- and you can take it or leave it -- is that the flixster synopsis is, well, let's just say it's not the synopsis I'd write. If I we... read morere doing the synopsis, I'd say probably that we should look for the earliest significant detail in this sorta-biopic "true" story of David Helfgott's roller-coaster life ride. But I don't even know who Gérard Genette is, so I'll just say this.

    If you'd like to look to the "source" of the problem in Helfgott's life, you might want to go -- not to his father -- the obvious choice -- but to the little stories Armin Mueller-Stahl, as Helfgott's father, let's surface over the course of the movie.

    Remember the violin story? Mueller-Stahl let's that one surface twice. It's the story, incomplete the second time, of how he saved his money to buy a violin, when he himself was a child, and "Do you know what happened to that violin?"

    The first time we hear the "complete" tale; we hear the conclusion. David's father's father smashed that violin to pieces. The second time we hear the story, when Geoffrey Rush is finally on board playing the older David, we do not hear the end of the sad story, but we don't need to hear it -- we already know that it was smashed up by David's grandfather.

    So what?

    Well, we might be tempted, on a first viewing, to place an incredible amount of the burden for David's "problems" on his father -- Mueller-Stahl is brilliant in this role. But I would place a cautionary tag on that assumption and argue that the problem goes back at least to some very hairy father-son relationship in the generation that comes before.

    A beautiful film, friends. I'm glad it finally bubbled up my rental queue.

    Last, but certainly not least, kudos to director Scott Hicks. I can't say I've ever seen anything he's done, but this is truly a beautiful job of film direction.
  • thmtsang
    April 12, 2008
    thmtsang
    EXcellent performance from Geoffrey Rush about an eccentric man who is a brilliant pianist.
  • DrZeek
    March 22, 2008
    DrZeek
    Cecil Parkes: Rachmaninov? Are you sure?
    David: Kind of. I'm not really sure about anything.
    Cecil Parkes: The Rach 3. It's monumental.
    David: It's a mountain. The hardest piece you could everest play.

    Here is a very good film about a child piano prodigy who was on his way to g... read morereatness, despite problems between him and his father, only to fall subject to a mental breakdown, but leading to essentially a building back up of himself.

    This movie is made better by the performances of Geoffrey Rush and Armin Mueller-Stahl.

    The film has separate parts, divided between three stages of the child prodigy, David Helfcot's life.

    Starting with the youngest version, we know David is talented, and his father, Mueller-Stahl, only wants the best from him, literally.

    Peter Helfgott: In this world only the strong survive. The weak get crushed like insects.

    Unfortunately, with good reason, David's father is very hesitant at allowing David to grow outside his home. It's not out of stubbornness, its more about not letting the family separate, which is clarified better in the film.

    The college aged David, played by Noah Taylor, has moved on as a greater piano player, with his father still wanting to keep him from growing to far, most of all not to America.

    During a particular performance, requiring all that he has, David literally breaks down and is never quite the same.

    Getting to adult David, played by Rush, David is now a very eccentric individual, sputtering words, laughing affably at most situations, but begins to play piano again.

    Once Rush takes the main spotlight of the film, the joy of this film truly takes off. Rush is so great in this role. A real piano player, the combination of this skill and a harnessing of David's mannerisms is portrayed very well.

    The soundtrack is of course wonderful as well.

    Great performances in this film.

    David: Would you marry me?
    Gillian: Well, it wouldn't be very practical, David.
    David: Practical? No, of course not. Of course not. But then neither am I, Gillian. Neither am I. I'm not very practical at all.
    Sylvia: You'll miss the plane!
    Gillian: It's sweet of you, David. I don't know what to say.
    David: The stars, Gillian darling! Ask the stars!
  • ebs90
    September 14, 2007
    ebs90
    This is a very difficult movie to take in. It's based on David Helfgott's true story: an international pianist child prodigy, mistreated and subjected to his father's insecurities to a dreadful degree, who suffered a breakdown during his adolescence and spent years living entirel... read morey away from reality until he overcame everything and returned to his passion: David, with the support he'd gained for being just a great person, was able to win back his life in the end. It's a very inspiring story in every sense of fhe word. The young David is played very wel by Noah Taylor, but the adult David is played by Geoffrey Rush in an Oscar winning performance. That's a good thing in this case.

    Geoffrey Rush's performance is really heartbreaking and amazing. Sweet and tender and at the same time hiding something from everyone else behind the fast talking and the cheerfulness and the jokes. I think he deserved the recognition that he got. He reminds me of the fact that really few epic performances like this one take place nowadays.

    So it's a movie made in the best tradition of the good Hollywood mainstream films. featuring many excellent performances. It's a really satisfying and emotionally poweful watch.

View All Shine Reviews

Critic Reviews

January 1, 2000
USA Today

Shine has a story to reckon with and powerhouse male performances.

Charles Cassady
February 1, 2011
Charles Cassady, Common Sense Media

Intense, gripping mental-illness music drama. Full Review

Emanuel Levy
December 25, 2007
Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com

With the exception of a few overwrought scenes, Hicks' Australian biopic of pianist David Helfgott, which caused a bidding war at the 1996 Sundance Fest, is fresh and emotionally stirring without bein... Full Review

Rob Gonsalves
September 23, 2007
Rob Gonsalves, eFilmCritic.com

The movie is really an Oscar sandwich -- stale bread surrounding a big piece of ham: Geoffrey Rush. Full Review

Michael Dequina
September 11, 2005
Michael Dequina, TheMovieReport.com

Inspiring, memorable cinema. Full Review

Rob Vaux
January 11, 2003
Rob Vaux, Flipside Movie Emporium

God save us from yet another holy fool movie. Geoffrey Rush has been much better.

Widgett Walls
January 4, 2003
Widgett Walls, Needcoffee.com

A tremendous biopic about overcoming the odds. It's what 'A Beautiful Mind' wants to grow up to be.

Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat
August 26, 2002
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice

Pays tribute to the important role of soul-friends in the nurturing of one's creative talents. Full Review

Alex Ramirez
August 31, 2001
Alex Ramirez, Cinenganos

Dará mucho de qué hablar, y les dejará un grato sabor de boca. Imposible no verla. Full Review

Shane Burridge
January 1, 2000
Shane Burridge, rec.arts.movies.reviews

Despite all the feel-good overtones, the story never gets sappy, sentimental, or manipulative

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  • In Pitch Black, how many menthol cools does it cost to get "a shine job" on your eyes?  Answer »
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