Movie: The Pianist
Starring Adrien Brody; Directed by Roman Polanski
Written by Ronald Harwood (Focus Features)
Reviewed by Rusty Pipes

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The Pianist is the true story of Polish classical pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman, who survived World War II in Warsaw. He made it through within the confines of the city itself, first in the walled-off Jewish quarter, through the Jewish uprising, then hiding out in abandoned apartments near a German run hospital, and lastly he survived Allied bombing and the withering Russian assault that made rubble out of the city. He was one of only twenty Jews who made it through. TWENTY, out of nearly 400,000 who lived there at the start of the war. So, is this movie the biggest story of the Holocaust? No, but this is certainly the most moving one since Schindler's List.

Unlike Spielberg's epic, Director Roman Polanski keeps his story narrowly focused on the trials of Szpilman. Adrien Brody is perfectly cast as the classical musician trapped in Hell. He starts out urbane and reservedly intellectual, changing by degrees as the Nazis take more and more of his life away. Strangely, he looks more like an Orthodox Jew as the movie progresses, due to a long beard he wears. For much of the movie he's the only person on screen, but he fills every frame with a stoic power, even as his life shrinks before our eyes. Perhaps the only thing that would have made the story more authentic is to have filmed it in Polish.

I've seen a lot of movies about the Holocaust, and sometimes I wonder how many times this story can be told. I've seen it now from so many different angles, but that is testimony to the magnitude of what the Nazis did to the Jews. After seeing this movie I can only think it's appropriate to tell this story again because every generation has to learn history for itself. It should be noted too that Roman Polanski is also one of only a handful of Polish Jews who survived the Nazi's extermination program, so it's amazing he's waited so long to make a film like this. That fact only adds to the film's power.

This is one of the most moving, gut-wrenching stories you will ever see. Its images kept haunting me long after the film was over.

The Skinny:
Am I glad I saw the film? Yes
Would I go to see it again? Everyone should see it at least once and if they don't get it, repeat the application until they do.

(Also starring Thomas Kretschmann, Emilia Fox, Maureen Lipman, Frank Finlay and Ed Stoppard.)

© 2003 - Rusty Pipes