The Pianist
Renowned director Roman Polanski has created a Holocaust movie. The subject matter has been beaten to the ground already, but Polanski, himself a Holocaust survivor, breathes new life into it by basing it on the memoirs of a Polish pianist named Wladyslaw Szpilman (Adrien Brody), starting with a bang, and ending it with triumph. The story begins with the German invasion of Poland. Warsaw has been bombed and the process of separating the Jews begins. First, they're barred from parks and various businesses. Then they have to wear armbands with the Star of David. Then it's a move to the newly created Warsaw ghetto. Then everyone must have a certificate of employment. All the while, Germans are everywhere, pushing them around and in some cases, killing them for no apparent reason. In the midst of these events, Szpilman and his family are forced to follow every rule passed down by the government until finally the Germans create concentration death camps for most of the Jews to go to. At the last minute, Szpilman is singled out by an old friend and spared. Separated from his family, he must survive on his own, going from place to place to place within Warsaw to avoid being caught. And through it all, his knowledge of the piano never leaves him. In fact, he keeps going because of it and owes his life to it in the end.

Brody's performance moves this film along. He has that innocent look a young child would have even though he has gone through a hellish period in his life. You could tell he would always remain positive, if muted, even when people were dying right in front of him. And with that, the audience remains mesmerized. How could he go through so much and not be dead yet? This instinct of survival has an unbelievable quality, but Brody makes us believe through the realism he brings into the role.

Polanski himself does a good job directing, rebounding from the disappointing The Ninth Gate from four years ago. It is a slow and calculating movie, showing every detail of Brody's transformation from successful pianist, to down-at-luck pianist to laborer to nomadic survivor, without lingering on any single event in the movie, like the shootings or the classic ghetto scenes firmly placed in our minds by previous films. Instead, everything by itself seems to be a blur but collectively, it marks one man's survival of five years in war-savaged Warsaw. 4 stars