The film director Stanley Kubrick deserves praise for incorporating serious art music into his films. Nowhere did he do so any more effectively than in the excruciatingly tense and deliciously slow dueling scene of “Barry Lyndon,” for which he employed the slow movement of Schubert’s Piano Trio in E-flat major.

One of the most dramatic efforts in the entire repertoire, the piece served as the centerpiece of a concert by the Vienna Piano Trio at the Frick Collection on Thursday evening. As this is summer and we’re all listening just a little less critically, let’s just say that their interpretation was, well, idiosyncratic.

Violinist Wolfgang Redik, pianist Stefan Mendl, and cellist Matthias Gredler played the Allegro reasonably well technically,but they provided little sense of the magically bobbing rhythmic flow of the movement, primarily because they inserted quite a few little pauses at the ends of phrases. This herky-jerky quality stood in contrast to Schubert’s smooth lines and left the impression that either the players were conceiving of the piece in an entirely new way, or that they simply needed a moment now and then to catch up.

The Andante con moto lacked the inexorability that Kubrick cherished.The opening tempo was laughably fast, and the main theme had little chance to establish itself as a prime example of neurasthenic beauty. This rushed feel only led to technical shortcomings as the movement progressed.

Mr. Redik has probably performed these passages dozens of times in rehearsal more accurately than he did this evening. Mr. Mendl, perhaps influenced by the inordinately speedy pace, left out notes rather than gloss over them – this was probably a wise decision – and added considerable weight to his touch, which was not so wise, since the resulting accompaniment was somewhat flabby. Mr. Gredler was virtually flawless in his enunciations, but his aggressive mates often drowned out his light tone.

Which leads us to the main transgression of the evening. Certainly the two Schubert trios are at the top of the chamber music list for sheer weight and power.These Austrians are well aware of the granitic nature of this movement, but they decided to gild the lily to make sure that their audience agreed with their thesis.The result was a central section taken at a very high volume that only seemed pedantic. The Frick’s concerts take place in a small room – and an oval one at that – and so the sounds from the makeshift stage reach the back row (where I was sitting) extremely quickly. But these men played as if they were in Avery Fisher Hall.

The Scherzo, with its infectious round wherein the melody repeats upon itself but starts the reiterations before the previous statement is finished, was better paced, but there were still those mini pauses with which to contend. This performance flickered, a bit like a silent film.The movement deserves more smoothness. Finally, the Allegro moderato was more of a standard performance, but Mr. Redik went off the rails a few more times than is socially acceptable.

Robert Schumann’s incredible chamber-music year of 1842 saw the creation of his three string quartets, the lovely Piano Quartet, the mighty Piano Quintet, and a rather unusual work, the “Fantasiestuecke” (fantasy pieces), Op. 88, for piano trio. Each of the four sections is a stand-alone aural vignette, a little children’s story or folk tale expressed in novelistic style.

Here the trio let its collective hair down a bit, allowing for a more robust Romanticism. In fact, these gentlemen demonstrated a fine sense of stylistic interpretation throughout this recital; they performed each of the three composers on the program performed in a manner befitting their chronology. It comes as no surprise that these musicians were trained in Europe, where music teachers have a more acute sense of historical import.

The evening opened with the birthday boy: The trio feted Mozart with a solid rendition of his Trio in B-flat major. The group had decided on the modern approach to Wolfgang, tempered only by a lighter, more staccato touch at the keyboard to simulate the pianoforte. Phrases in the strings were sometimes taken a little sentimentally and there was probably a tad too much emphasis on the individual note crescendo, but someone with more catholic tastes would have found this type of emotive communication highly satisfying.