Hitting the Right Note

Rating: 9/10 (30 August 2016)

"Thank God not me. He wants us to survive. Well, that's what we have to believe."
The challenge of bringing Wladyslaw Szpilman's story to the screen could find no better conduit than Roman Polanski, whose own wartime experiences bear such tragic similarity. Aged just nine years old, Polanski was thrown by his doomed mother from a transport bound for Auschwitz concentration camp. He then had to learn how to survive the harsh realities of the Krakow ghetto, by any means available, before being rescued by the courageousness of a Polish family preventing him sharing the fate of others when the ghetto was liquidated. Polanski thus brings all his undoubted directorial talent to provide artistic expression to this barbaric period of human history, much in the same vein as the literary brilliance of another Holocaust survivor, Primo Levi. As such, he can lay bare not just the evils perpetrated, but also the stark reality that when faced with such inhumane treatment, as Levi expressed it: 'man is bound to pursue his own ends by all possible means'. In the Oscar- winning adapted screenplay by successful playwright Ronald Harwood, Szpilman is portrayed in no heroic terms, but rather as an individual with the desperation, guile, and simple fortune to survive. Harwood has stated in no uncertain terms how aspects of the screenplay were made easier to transfer to the big screen by Polanski's own contributions. In interview, Polanski has himself explained: 'I could use my own experiences in the script without making it an autobiography'. Adrian Brody, a master of the understated performance, is able to capture this individual's gradual descent into a simple mechanical pursuit of survival at any cost, and general torpor in the face of the horrors which Szpilman witnessed. Thus, the lead character, who earlier displays a sense of finely- tuned compassion for others, is transformed into the dispassionate observer of the bloody reprisals outside the windows of his refuge. Deserving of his Oscar for best performance in a leading role, and losing a fifth of his body-weight in preparation for the part, Brody became the youngest recipient ever to receive this award at the age of 29. Brody is ably supported by a largely British cast, more familiar for their work within television drama, and thus, relatively unknown to wider cinema audiences. Special mention should be made of the performances by Ed Stoppard as Szpilman's feisty brother, Henryk, and Frank Finlay as his browbeaten father. In addition, Roy Smiles is memorable as the turncoat recruit to the Jewish police, Itzak Heller, who plucks Szpilman from the line waiting to board the transport to Auschwitz, thereby saving him from sharing his family's fate. Polanski expertly explores the psychological and emotional impact upon Szpilman's family as they attempt to come to terms with increasing persecution at the hands of their oppressors. The film contains many haunting scenes depicting the Nazi regime's barbarity, but two which resonate with this reviewer are the cursory execution of a young woman for merely asking 'where are you taking us?', and the desperate wailing of a woman who had suffocated her baby in a futile attempt to avoid detection. Although this film obviously has an emotive impact on the audience, at times it can appear more removed from its subject than other feature films covering the genocide. There is obvious contrast in this treatment to Spielberg's more obvious attempts to tug at his audience's emotional heart- strings. Though Polanski deserves credit for such gritty realism, this film suffers slightly as a cinematic experience due to the fact that Szpilman's cool detachment can distance the character from the audience. However, Szpilman's amazing story allows for the introduction of ill-fated Captain Wilm Hosenfeld, whose compassion and love of music not only saves the eponymous musician from starvation or capture and execution, but also enables a re-emergence of common humanity into this bleak narrative. Sensitively portrayed by regularly cast as Nazi officer, Thomas Kretschmann, the former Nazi devotee, Hosenfeld, appalled at the brutality shown to Poles and Jews during his military service in the East, would risk reprisal to harbour several individuals from Nazi repression, Szpilman among them. So unjust that upon being captured by Red Army forces, he would be imprisoned for seven long years and tortured to death in a Soviet concentration camp in 1952, despite all efforts of Szpikman to track him down and have him released. This unforgettable encounter between Szpilman and his saviour raises this to a movie worthy of receiving the Palm D'Or. Moreover, this work marked Polanski's return to critical recognition, winning his first Academy award for direction at the fourth attempt, and his first award in the States since winning the Golden Globe for 'Chinatown' in 1975.