Laura Mulvey in her essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema states that 'in a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female' (Mulvey, 1975, 9) whereby men look and women are looked at. In order to break down the patriarchal hierarchy the 'active controller of the look' (Mulvey, 1975, 11) must be changed. Initially in The Piano Ada is the object of Baines gaze, as he watches her play the piano and project sexual fantasies onto her. However, later in the film, a high angle shot of Baines in the corner of his dark cabin emotionally confessing his love for Ada while she stands there staring at him, thus reverses the 'look' and shows Ada becoming more powerful. .
Campion again destroys the active/passive split when Ada's husband locks her up after witnessing her have sex with Baines. Ada's desire for bodily contact and manipulative control of Stewart leads her to bed with him where she caresses his naked body. Here, Ada is seen as the looker and Stewart as the looked at. To further consolidate this, Campion shows that when Stewart tries to look and touch Ada, she pulls away and he is rejected, giving her complete power of the look as she purposefully defies the patriarchal system in place. As Bihhlmeyer puts it the 'female gaze signifies a break from the Law of the Father' (Bihhlmeyer, 2005, 69). Campion also shows Ada's power in Baines' and Stewart's numerous attempts at rape. There are many suggestive scenes including Baines forcefully kissing and grabbing Ada, Stewart attempting to tear of her clothes in the woods and also when Ada is sleeping, Stewart is seen kissing her thighs. These scenes speak to the disrespectful attitude towards women and also the physical dominance and control the men have over Ada. However due to the unseeable power she retains, Ada is never actually raped and maintains her sexuality within her control.
