THE PIANIST
Poland, 2002, 149 minutes, Colour.
Adrien Brodie, Thomas Kretschmann, Frank Finlay, Maureen Lippman, Emilia Fox, Ed Stoppard.
Directed by Roman Polanski.
The events portrayed in this film took place sixty years ago during one of the greatest horror stories and tragedies of the 20th century, the Holocaust. Each decade has produced its cinema version of these events: the 1970s miniseries, Holocaust, Sophie's Choice in the 1980s and, of course, Schindler's List in the 1990s. The survivors are now growing older and dying. These films contribute to keeping our consciences alert, 'Lest we forget'.
One person who has not forgotten is Polish film director, Roman Polanksi, who will turn seventy this year. As a little boy, Polanski himself escaped the bombing of Warsaw with his father and joined his mother in the ghetto in Kracow. She later died in the camps. He was helped by non-Jewish friends in Krakow and survived. Pain has followed Polanski. When he was thirty five, his wife Sharon Tate was brutally murdered by Charles Manson and his followers. Some of this suffering went into his films, especially his violent version of Macbeth made after his wife's death.
With The Pianist, Polanski is able, at last, to share something of his childhood story. The telling, however, while it has terrible moments of Nazi atrocities towards the Jews, is done in a more traditional, classical way of film-making, not what might expect from the often bizarre Polanski. The screenplay, by England's Ronald Harwood, is straightforward in its narrative. The film uses many authentic Warsaw locations as well as computer graphic effects that re-create the impact of the invasion of the city. The Pianist won the Palme D'Or in Cannes in 2002.
But it is not Polanski's story. As director, he is almost anonymous. What he has done is to take the opportunity to tell his own childhood story through the memoirs of an actual Jewish pianist, Wladislaw Szpilman (who died in July 2000). Throughout the film Szpilman and Polanski seem to be observers of Warsaw's suffering rather than participants in it. While this gives a different perspective on the deportations, the ghetto uprising, the Polish resistance and the entry of the Russians to liberate the city, the film spends a lot of time with the pianist's lone exile and patient survival, hidden in apartments and dependent on kind and fearful neighbours. With Szpilman, we frequently look out of windows, helpless in the face of what we see.
Szpilman is played by American actor, Adrien Brody, who enters deeply into his character, portraying the grief at the upheaval of his family, playing music in the cafe's of Warsaw, using his fingers to 'play' silently with the music inside his head offering him some sanity and consolation. As in the film, in real life Szpilman was discovered by a Nazi officer who was moved by his music and protected him before he himself disappeared into the Russian camps.
This is a film of great sadness and beauty and one comes away with a deep sense of the inhumanity of the Nazis, the humiliation of the Jews and their suffering.
1. The acclaim for the film, Cannes, Oscars? A memoir for Roman Polanski, his career, his perspective on life, characters? The experience of the evil, brutality and violence in his life? His growing up during the war, losing his mother, with his father, family? His isolation in the ghetto? His film as a memoir for the Poles, the Germans, a perspective on the 20th century?
2. The film's use of polish locations, Warsaw? The reconstruction of the city, 1939-45, the experience of the war, from prosperity to destruction? The computer graphics, the reconstruction of the bombed city? The city and its life, the ghetto, the free area, the streets, the walls, cars, trams? The trains and the deportations? The arrival of the Russians and the impact on the city?
3. Wladyslaw Szpilman and his being the centre of the film, his perspective on the war, not in action, hidden away, observing the violence? The film as the audience's perspective on the war through Wladyslaw? The attention to detail, making the audiences feel immersed in the experience?
4. The role of the music, music on the radio, the attack, the café and the rich customers listening to the music, the issue of art versus work, the musical sensibility, the selling of the piano, the music in Wladyslaw's memory and imagination, fingering the music when he had no piano, the silent playing above the piano for security's sake, the officer discovering his music, his later career? The tradition of Polish music, Polish composers, Chopin _?
5. Polanski using classic film-making techniques, not indulging in his idiosyncratic style, his macabre perspectives?
6. The background of Jews in Poland, anti-Semitism? Poles and the Germans? Dr Fischer, propaganda, persecution? The Nazi takeover, the gutter, money, armbands, the ghetto, the deportation? The treatment of people, the children, the bashings, the shootings, making the old couple dance in the street? Ordinary Poles and this experience, their acceptance of what the Nazis did? The women screaming, yet the kindness, the food, the Resistance and the dangers for Poles helping the Jews? The collection of money?
7. Wladyslaw's family, ordinary Poles, their way of life, the invasion, their finding ways to cope, the optimism of the father, the mother worried, the girls, the brother and his anger, being active yet not joining the police, the friends who joined the Jewish police? The prisoner, ousted? The selling of the piano, getting favours? Wladyslaw seeing his family shot in the streets? The selling of the books? The packing, the family ready to go, waiting all day in the courtyard, the money just for a sweet, the bonds, Wladyslaw expecting to go with his family, his being saved and thrust away? His love for his family, the memories? The train carriages and the departure?
8. The discussion about the extermination of the Jews, especially the old people? The Resistance, following the trains to Treblinka? The information available about what was really happening?
9. Wladyslaw and his continuing to play, the attacks, Dorota and her brother? His own brother, in and out of the ghetto, the customers for whom he played, his having to hide himself, the caring people, the bodies, the bricks, the nails? His contacts and his escape, in the apartment, alone, watching everything out of the window, keeping silent? The people bringing him food? The dangers? The Resistance and the friends, arrests, his being locked in? The people who wanted to exploit the situation, get money? Lies, deceit? His having to move, nearer to the headquarters, to the hospital? The time passing, his own illness? Dorota and the help? The attack, his going on the roof, running? Finding shelter in the hospital, food? His coming out, the devastated city, the streets? His encounter with the officer, playing the piano, the officer giving him the coat? His being saved, his statement that, "I am a Pole"?
10. The wealthy Jews during the Occupation, the cafes - yet their being taken to the trains?
11. The Resistance, Jamina and her husband, Dorota and her husband?
12. The arrival of the Nazis, the attacks, the violence and brutality? The contrast with the officer, the friendship, the support, Wladyslaw and his playing the piano? The arrival of the Russians, the new occupation? The German officer and his appeal to Wladyslaw to seek him out?
13. The post-war period, Wladyslaw and his outbursts, his anger in the aftermath of the war, his searching for the officer, the concentration camp, the official perhaps having the wrong name, the disappearance of the officer? The contrast with Wladyslaw's career, popular music, living until 2000?
14. Polanski's perspective on World War II, German ambitions, the role of the Nazis? The treatment of the Jews, the extermination? The impact on ordinary Poles, their consciences, their treatment of the Jews? The Jews themselves, the extermination, the survivors alone, eking out existence, having to be individualistic? The arrival of the Russians, the aftermath of the war in Poland and the Communist era? Polanski and his life, career, opportunities and his assessment of the war at the end of the 20th century?
