Polanski's take on the Holocaust? No, Polanski's rumination on Szpilman

Rating: Null/10 (31 January 2003)

What lifts this remarkable film out of what might be called the "Holocaust genre"--and there have been exceptional films within that genre--is that the unimaginable horrors, grotesqueries, and heroism that must have been part of the fabric of that incomprehensible era are here a sort of backdrop to what I felt was Polanski's primary focus: the astonishingly hermetic isolation of Szpilman, the pianist so beautifully captured by Adrien Brody's performance. Certainly, Polanski's rendering of the daily mixture of ghoulishness, brutality, and bravery is breathtaking, owing in large part, I'm sure, to Mr. Polanski's personal experience of that time and place. The vividness with which Szpilman's world is captured makes all the more astonishing the man's isolation within it. He remains separated from the heroic Jews who rise up and fight the Nazis, nor is he one of the accommodating Jews who, for whatever motivation, assist the Nazis in their persecutions and slaughter. Nor is he one of the brave Poles who risk everything to help him. He is, in the end, always a target or a beneficiary, always an object, never a subject. His only stated goal: to survive and play music again. No wonder Polanski seems to have found the real-life Szpilman's memoir fascinating and worthy of his attentions. And he has certainly met the enormous challenge of turning the memoir into a film that should be seen by anyone who is not too upset by images of shocking violence and ugliness that, after a while, the viewer becomes desensitized to, much as the central character does. I do not think that Polanski intends us to particularly admire the title character, or for that matter, to deplore him, but only to meditate on him and his extraordinary response to the ghastly circumstances in which he found himself. This is certainly one of Polanski's great achievements, and his finest in many years.