The Pianist (2002)

[Plain Old Tele]

Discuss.

[IndustriousAngel]

Intense but too depressing for my taste.

[luna]

Intense and appropriately depressing. Perhaps it is my misanthropic and almost nihilistic views but the beauty found in a tragedy of this scale is something to behold. the scene of the piano is just so incredibly touching. absolutely perfect.

 

10/10

[Lordmandeep]

Easily one of the best movies in this rather dark and depressing genre.

 

The film is quite sad but you really rally behind the character.

 

Two scenes that get to me are...

 

1. The whole family is about to be shipped off, and they can afford one chocolate, the last time the family is all together.

 

2. He is asked to play the piano for the German Officer. It is quite strong reminder that in war everyone starts to become faceless, but behind each person they had talents, personality and a whole life. 

 

 

A 

[tommycruise]

An absolute masterpiece. Adrien Brody is completely perfect in this(and too bad he hasn't had too much success since then) and the atmosphere was really well done in this movie.

A

[Lumos]

I remember watching this film on TV in 2003 or 2004 when I was just eleven years old. Even though I was pretty young I was still completely floored by how powerful this film was...and more than a little disturbed. The scene where the SS soldier throws the old man off the balcony scared the shit out of me. I think this was the first film that made me realize that a film can be more than just mindless entertainment and instead represent something of actual significance.A+And really, this should have won best picture in 2002. This or The Two Towers.

[baumer]

Chicago won best picture that yr.Try saying that again without barfing.

[Lordmandeep]

I remember watching this film on TV in 2003 or 2004 when I was just eleven years old. Even though I was pretty young I was still completely floored by how powerful this film was...and more than a little disturbed. The scene where the SS soldier throws the old man off the balcony scared the shit out of me. I think this was the first film that made me realize that a film can be more than just mindless entertainment and instead represent something of actual significance.A+And really, this should have won best picture in 2002. This or The Two Towers.

 

 

Yeah watching that in my late teens was intense, I can't imagine watching that at that age.

 

I remember I had nightmares after watching Come and See. 

[luna]

just sayin', but may 2nd is quite a long time ago, and a lot of things can change in the intervening time...

[baumer]

I can remember when this film came out I was adamantly against seeing it. I had my preconceived notions that it would be some other heroic Jewish Holocaust film where good triumphs over evil and in between we would see some brutal atrocities committed by the Germans to add some flavour.

How wrong I was.

This is one of the best films I have ever seen and what it did to me I cannot describe in words. But in a nutshell, it moved me, made me cry, made me feel like I was in the Polish ghetto in 1940, and ultimately made me kiss the sidewalks as I walked out of the theater and thanked God that I live in the free society that I do. 

Roman Polanski has proved that he is a great director with films like Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby but this is his crowning achievement. I think the fact that this won the awards that it did at this years Oscars goes a long way to validate the brilliance of this film. I believe that the Oscar's are rigged for the most part and films and actresses and such win based more on their pedigree or business associations than anything else, so when it won best actor and director and adapted screenplay this year, it tells you that it should have won best picture but the Weinsteins seem to have a spell over everyone, hence a charlatan like Chicago takes top prize. Sorry for the digression here but when you compare a "film" like Chicago to a masterpiece like The Pianist, there really is one clear cut winner. They handed out the statue to the wrong movie.

The Pianist follows up and coming piano player Wlad Spielzman from his days as a local hero to a prisoner of war to his time in the ghettos, surviving only by the kindness of strangers. I think many people have touched on this before but what makes this film so amazing and well crafted is because Spielzman is a man that we can all relate to. He is not a hero, he is not a rebel and he is not a kamikaze type that wants and lusts after revenge. He is a simple man that is doing everything in his power to stay alive. He is a desperate man and fears for his life and wants to stay as low as he can. Only from the succor he receives from others does he manage to live and breathe and eat and hide. And this is how I related to him. If put in his position, how would I react? Exactly the way he did. This is a man that had everything taken from him. His livelihood, his family, his freedom and almost his life. There is no time for heroics here. Adrien Brody embodies the spirit of Spielzman and his win at this years Oscars was one of the happiest moments I have had watching the festivities. His speech was even better but that is a topic for another time.

Ultimately it is his gift of music that perhaps saves his life and the final scene that he has with the German soldier is one of the most emotionally galvanizing scenes I've witnessed. With very little dialogue, it is in the eyes, the face, the mouth and the sounds that chime throughout their tiny space that tell you all you need to know. I think it is this scene that won Brody his Oscar. This is one of the all time great performances.

I think Polanski spoke from the heart here. He has taken a palette of memories and amalgamated them with what he has read and given us one of the best films of our generation and any other. I think The Pianist will go down as one of the best films of this century and when all is said and done, Chicago will be forgotten the way Ordinary People was forgotten and when people talk about the film The Pianist, they will do so with reverence and respect. This is a cinematic masterpiece.

10 out of 10

[dashrendar44]

The problem I have with crowning this as the best film of the year 2002 and saying it's one of the most emotional films of all time and so on is that it's easy to make a film about jewish Holocaust a raw and gut wrenching thing to sit through. It's about Shoah and it's about terrible things that were done to people. How can it not be emotional and raw and powerful and so on? All you have to do is show people being hunted, tortured and then the aftermath of their scars.

 

This is Escape from Sobibor light. Escape from Sobibor did it better when it came out 30 years ago and it did nothing to change anything.  As Arnold says in Terminator 2, "It's in your nature to destroy yourselves."

Edited January 16, 2014 by dashrendar44

[Plain Old Tele]

I think the counter-argument to that (at least in terms of this film) is that it's not about the overall Holocaust. It's fairly small in scope and some of the key emotional moments don't have anything to do with mass-extermination, it's about the small individual moments of cruelty or kindness that shape someone's life.

[baumer]

I think the counter-argument to that (at least in terms of this film) is that it's not about the overall Holocaust. It's fairly small in scope and some of the key emotional moments don't have anything to do with mass-extermination, it's about the small individual moments of cruelty or kindness that shape someone's life.

 

He's just posting that to me Tele.  That's what I said about 12YAS.  

 

Touche Dash.  Touche.

[Plain Old Tele]

LOL.

[baumer]

For the record, I kind of agree with Dash.  The subject matter in a Holocaust film does make it hard not to make an emotional film.  However, there is very very little disturbing images in The Pianist, not the way Schindler's List has them.  As Tele said, it's more about human emotions and music and survival, not about shooting Jews in the head as target practice. 

[Lordmandeep]

I agree one of the most emotional scenes is of course the wheel chair scene.

 

However the family sharing a chocolate as they are about to sent to die and the main character playing the Piano for the German officer were the best scenes.

[dashrendar44]

For the record, I kind of agree with Dash.  The subject matter in a Holocaust film does make it hard not to make an emotional film.  However, there is very very little disturbing images in The Pianist, not the way Schindler's List has them.  As Tele said, it's more about human emotions and music and survival, not about shooting Jews in the head as target practice. 

 

But Polanski had it easy because he followed heart-wrenching Szpilman's memoirs just like McQueen got it easy because he followed gut-wrenching Solomon Northup's memoirs*, right?

 

(*That was your argument about 12 Years A Slave, how about it is "easy" to make a powerful tearjerker about slavery, just "copy/paste" the original autobiography with lot of black people being whipped, then you got your Oscar baiting masterpiece. To tell you straight, that cynical stance about "easiness" on that subject grated me to no end)

 

I didn't know both books featured all the notes how to direct the scenes, which angles/lenses/takes to choose, how to cut the movie, which music to use and where, there on the page so anyone could do the same movie with the same powerful resonance, acting and imagery whoever ended up directing...Sure Brett Ratner's 12 Years A Slave and Mark Steven Johnson's The Pianist would have been the same movies as those we ended up with...

 

Either way, you deny the filmmaker a voice, a vision, his own ability and intelligence to translate written words into powerful and cathartic visual experience that makes it stand among it all.

Edited January 17, 2014 by dashrendar44

[Kalel009Shel]

I can remember when this film came out I was adamantly against seeing it. I had my preconceived notions that it would be some other heroic Jewish Holocaust film where good triumphs over evil and in between we would see some brutal atrocities committed by the Germans to add some flavour.

How wrong I was.

This is one of the best films I have ever seen and what it did to me I cannot describe in words. But in a nutshell, it moved me, made me cry, made me feel like I was in the Polish ghetto in 1940, and ultimately made me kiss the sidewalks as I walked out of the theater and thanked God that I live in the free society that I do. 

Roman Polanski has proved that he is a great director with films like Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby but this is his crowning achievement. I think the fact that this won the awards that it did at this years Oscars goes a long way to validate the brilliance of this film. I believe that the Oscar's are rigged for the most part and films and actresses and such win based more on their pedigree or business associations than anything else, so when it won best actor and director and adapted screenplay this year, it tells you that it should have won best picture but the Weinsteins seem to have a spell over everyone, hence a charlatan like Chicago takes top prize. Sorry for the digression here but when you compare a "film" like Chicago to a masterpiece like The Pianist, there really is one clear cut winner. They handed out the statue to the wrong movie.

The Pianist follows up and coming piano player Wlad Spielzman from his days as a local hero to a prisoner of war to his time in the ghettos, surviving only by the kindness of strangers. I think many people have touched on this before but what makes this film so amazing and well crafted is because Spielzman is a man that we can all relate to. He is not a hero, he is not a rebel and he is not a kamikaze type that wants and lusts after revenge. He is a simple man that is doing everything in his power to stay alive. He is a desperate man and fears for his life and wants to stay as low as he can. Only from the succor he receives from others does he manage to live and breathe and eat and hide. And this is how I related to him. If put in his position, how would I react? Exactly the way he did. This is a man that had everything taken from him. His livelihood, his family, his freedom and almost his life. There is no time for heroics here. Adrien Brody embodies the spirit of Spielzman and his win at this years Oscars was one of the happiest moments I have had watching the festivities. His speech was even better but that is a topic for another time.

Ultimately it is his gift of music that perhaps saves his life and the final scene that he has with the German soldier is one of the most emotionally galvanizing scenes I've witnessed. With very little dialogue, it is in the eyes, the face, the mouth and the sounds that chime throughout their tiny space that tell you all you need to know. I think it is this scene that won Brody his Oscar. This is one of the all time great performances.

I think Polanski spoke from the heart here. He has taken a palette of memories and amalgamated them with what he has read and given us one of the best films of our generation and any other. I think The Pianist will go down as one of the best films of this century and when all is said and done, Chicago will be forgotten the way Ordinary People was forgotten and when people talk about the film The Pianist, they will do so with reverence and respect. This is a cinematic masterpiece.

10 out of 10

Wow Baumer.. I always like the actor who starred in the piano and King Kong 2005. Never knew you got into so deeply.

I need to check it out my friend and post my thoughts.. I however hate the films that have a horrible depressing end, so I hope

there is a triumph of spirt somewhere in it lol

[Kalel009Shel]

But Polanski had it easy because he followed heart-wrenching Szpilman's memoirs just like McQueen got it easy because he followed gut-wrenching Solomon Northup's memoirs*, right?

 

(*That was your argument about 12 Years A Slave, how about it is "easy" to make a powerful tearjerker about slavery, just "copy/paste" the original autobiography with lot of black people being whipped, then you got your Oscar baiting masterpiece. To tell you straight, that cynical stance about "easyness" on that subject grated me to no end)

 

I didn't know both books featured all the notes how to direct the scenes, cut the movie, which music to use and where, there on the page so anyone could do the same movie with the same powerful resonance, acting and imagery whoever ended up directing...Sure Brett Ratner's 12 Years A Slave and Mark Steven Johnson's The Pianist would have been the same movies as those we ended up with...

 

Either way, you deny the filmmaker a voice, a vision, his own ability and intelligence to translate written words into powerful and cathartic visual experience that makes it stand among it all.

Amen my brother folks who say nonsense like  anyone could pull off films  like Titanic, Pianist,

the accused because of its theme and dont recognize the work that  goes into the music, storytelling,editing managing

your actors so you get their best range possible for each take etc.. They definitely have no respect for the film process.

 

Indeed its the greatest of folks like James Cameron, Speilberg, Polansk, Nolan that seperate them from

the Ratners and Micheal bays out there.  I also need to see 12 yrs of the slave as well.

 

I think subject matter does matter, but its how one puts their package together and the mini-moments of it all

that seperate the greats from the hollywood manufactured directors who all have a set formula of sorts.

Edited January 17, 2014 by Superman001

[baumer]

You do realize I gave 12yas a 9/10....