‘Tuner’ Review: A Strange, Stylish Crime Film Tuned to a Different Frequency

Dustin Hoffman hasn’t appeared on screen all that much in recent years, so his return in Tuner is more than welcome. This curious blend of drama, romantic comedy and thriller features him as one of its central characters. But, in a way, that is also something of a trap. While Hoffman is by far the best-known name in the cast—at least for those of a certain generation—his role is actually significant only during the film’s first act. From then on, his character, musician and piano tuner Harry Horowitz, becomes more of a beacon and a guide than a protagonist. But the flame he lights never quite goes out.

Tuner begins as a comedy. Harry and his apprentice, Niki (Leo Woodall), travel from mansion to mansion across Manhattan, tuning the pianos of wealthy clients who, they know, barely ever play them. “They’re mostly decorative,” they joke. Still, the two are paid well for their work, even when the same rich clients ask if they might also unclog a pipe while they’re there.

They make an unlikely but effective team. Niki has perfect pitch, but also suffers from hyperacusis, a condition that leaves him wearing headphones almost constantly because he cannot tolerate the sonic chaos of everyday life. Harry is his mentor, the person guiding him through the imperfect craft of making a piano sound exactly as it should.

Things begin to unravel when Harry, now in his eighties, suffers a health problem and is hospitalized, leaving Niki to work on his own. Without his older mentor’s reassuring presence, he travels through the city alone, and his personality begins to take a darker turn. On the one hand, he has a promising encounter. He meets Ruthie (Havana Rose Liu), a gifted and dedicated classical pianist who is trying to secure a scholarship and needs her piano to sound perfect. It is immediately obvious that there is something between them, although the troubled Niki, without Harry around to steady him, cannot bring himself to act on it.

The other encounter is considerably more dubious. During one of his jobs, Niki crosses paths with a group of shady security-system installers who sometimes help themselves to valuables from the safes they encounter in their clients’ homes. “Millionaires don’t even notice,” they tell him. And because Niki’s perfect pitch allows him to hear the sounds made by safe combinations and open them with remarkable ease—and because he needs money to help cover Harry’s medical expenses—they recruit him for their crew. Despite his ethical reservations, he agrees.

This is where Tuner gradually introduces a thriller element that becomes increasingly prominent. A series of dangerous heists and growing tensions within the gang give the film greater narrative momentum, but they also diminish some of the unusual chemistry established between Niki, Ruthie, Harry and even Harry’s wife, Marla (the delightful veteran actress Tovah Feldshuh). The film becomes more serious and more conventional, more overtly dangerous: gangsters, threats, complications, lies. It never entirely loses its initial charm, but it does leave some of it behind.

One of the film’s most intriguing elements, both narratively and formally, comes from Niki’s unusual relationship with sound. He wears heavy noise-cancelling headphones whenever he is out on the street—taking them off to work on the pianos, though he keeps smaller ones on—and during several particularly intense sequences, his auditory vulnerability becomes a source of danger. As in the recent Sound of Metal, Roher uses sound design to place the audience inside Niki’s head, making us experience his sensations as the world around him begins to fall apart and everyday noises become chaotic and unbearable. In that respect, Tuner is one of the recent films to make the most effective dramatic use of ambient sound.

The final stretch is rushed and somewhat heavy-handed, filled with the kind of unlikely coincidences associated with a lesser thriller. Jean Reno even turns up in a key role. But beyond those weaknesses, which are perhaps understandable in a first fiction feature, Tuner is striking for the originality of its premise and its ability to remain accessible without ever losing its cool.

There are even cameos by Herbie Hancock and an excellent jazz score. More importantly, Roher displays a remarkable command of narrative and audiovisual mechanics. After making documentaries almost exclusively—most notably his excellent film about Robbie Robertson and The Band—he suddenly seems to transform himself into an apprentice of Steven Soderbergh’s lighter crime films, or perhaps someone who has studied every detail of Michael Mann’s Thief.

For all its limitations, there is a very good film—and a very New York film—inside Tuner.