The Pianist (2002 film)

"Le Pianiste" redirects here. For the 2001 French film originally titled La Pianiste, see The Piano Teacher.

The Pianist
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Roman Polanski
Produced by	Roman Polanski Robert Benmussa Alain Sarde Gene Gutowski
Screenplay by	Ronald Harwood
Based on	The Pianist by Władysław Szpilman
Starring	Adrien Brody Thomas Kretschmann Frank Finlay Maureen Lipman Emilia Fox Michał Żebrowski
Music by	Wojciech Kilar Frederic Chopin
Cinematography	Paweł Edelman
Editing by	Hervé de Luze
Studio	Studio Canal+ Canal+ Studio Babelsberg
Distributed by	Focus Features Universal Studios
Release date(s)	24 May 2002 (2002-05-24) (Cannes) 6 September 2002 (2002-09-06) (Poland) 27 December 2002 (2002-12-27) (US) 6 March 2003 (2003-03-06) (UK)
Running time	150 minutes
Country	France Poland Germany United Kingdom
Language	English Polish German Russian
Budget	$35 million
Box office	$120,072,577

The Pianist is a 2002 biographical war film directed by Roman Polanski, starring Adrien Brody. It is an adaptation of the autobiography of the same name by Jewish-Polish musician Władysław Szpilman. The film is a co-production between Poland, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.

The film met with significant critical praise and received multiple awards and nominations. At the 75th Academy Awards, The Pianist won Oscars for Best Director (Roman Polanski), Best Adapted Screenplay (Ronald Harwood) and Best Actor (Adrien Brody). The film was also nominated for four other awards, including the Academy Award for Best Picture.

The film was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival, BAFTA Award for Best Film, BAFTA Award for Best Direction in 2003 and seven French Césars including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor for Brody.

Plot

In 1939, Władysław Szpilman (Adrien Brody), a Polish Jewish pianist, has his radio station rocked from German bombing with Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland and the subsequent outbreak of World War II. Hoping for a quick victory, Szpilman rejoices with family at home when learning that Britain and France have declared war on Germany. However the Germans enter Warsaw and living conditions for the Jews deteriorate. They are allowed a limited amount of money and later must wear armbands with the Star of David. By November 1940, they are forced into horrid and humiliating conditions in the Warsaw Ghetto, where Szpilman's family witness an SS group raid a home, throw a disabled man off the balcony and gun down others.

Soon the family are rounded up for deportation to Treblinka to be exterminated but Szpilman is saved by a friend in the Jewish Ghetto Police. Szpilman becomes a slave labourer where he learns of a coming uprising and helps by smuggling weapons into the ghetto, narrowly avoiding a suspicious guard. He manages to escape and go into hiding with help from a non-Jewish friend, Andrzej Bogucki and his wife. In 1943, Szpilman watches the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising he aided and the aftermath as the perpetrators are killed. A year goes by and Szpilman is forced to flee after a neighbor discovers him. In a second hiding place provided to him, he is shown into a room with a piano but forced to keep quiet, and suffers jaundice.

In August 1944, Polish resistance mounts the Warsaw Uprising. Szpilman watches the insurgents fighting from a window as a German tank shells his apartment. Warsaw is abandoned and Szpilman, entirely alone, searches desperately for supplies. He sleeps in an empty dental hospital and eventually makes his way to an abandoned home where he finds a can of pickles. While trying to open it he is discovered by Wehrmacht captain Wilm Hosenfeld (Thomas Kretschmann) who learns that he is a pianist and asks him to play on the grand piano in the house. The decrepit Szpilman plays Ballade in G-Minor, Op. 23, which moves Hosenfeld, who then allows Szpilman to hide in the attic of the building and regularly brings him food. As the German soldiers are forced to retreat due to the advance of the Red Army, Hosenfeld meets Szpilman for the last time and promises to listen to him on Polish Radio. He gives Szpilman his greatcoat to keep warm and leaves, which is almost fatal for Szpilman when he is shot at by Polish troops liberating Warsaw, who apprehend him and realise he is Polish.

Freed prisoners of a concentration camp pass an enclosure of German prisoners of war guarded by Soviet soldiers, and hurl abuses at them. Hosenfeld, now a prisoner, asks a violinist if he knows Szpilman, which the violinist confirms. Szpilman is visited by the violinist, who takes him to the site. However, all the prisoners have vanished along with any trace of the enclosure. Later, Szpilman performs Chopin's Grand Polonaise brillante to a large and prestigious audience. An epilogue states that Szpilman passed away at the age of 88 in 2000, while Hosenfeld died in a Russian prisoner of war camp in 1952.

Cast

• Adrien Brody as Władysław Szpilman
• Thomas Kretschmann as Captain Wilm Hosenfeld
• Frank Finlay as Father Szpilman
• Maureen Lipman as Mother Szpilman
• Ronan Vibert as Andrzej Bogucki
• Ruth Platt as Janina Bogucki
• Emilia Fox as Dorota
• Michał Żebrowski as Jurek
• Ed Stoppard as Henryk
• Jessica Kate Meyer as Halina
• Julia Rayner as Regina
• Richard Ridings as Mr. Lipa
• Daniel Caltagirone as Majorek
• Valentine Pelka as Dorota's husband

Production

The story had deep connections with director Roman Polanski because he escaped from the Krakow Ghetto as a child after the death of his mother. He ended up living in a Polish farmer's barn until the war's end. His father almost died in the camps, but they reunited after the end of World War II.

Joseph Fiennes was Polanski's first choice for the lead role, but he turned it down due to a previous commitment to the theatre. Over 1,400 actors auditioned for the role of Wladyslaw Szpilman at a casting call in London. Unsatisfied with all who tried, director Roman Polanski sought to cast Adrien Brody, whom he saw as ideal for the role during their first meeting in Paris.

Filming

Principal photography on The Pianist began on 9 February 2001 in Studio Babelsberg in Potsdam, Germany. The Warsaw Ghetto and the surrounding city were recreated on the backlot of Babelsberg Studios as they would have looked during the war. Old Soviet army barracks were used to create the ruined city, as they were going to be destroyed anyway.

The first scenes of the film were shot at the old army barracks. Soon after, the filmmakers moved to a villa in Potsdam, which served as the house where Szpilman meets Hosenfeld. On 2 March 2001, filming then moved to an abandoned Soviet army hospital in Beelitz, Germany. The scenes that featured the Germans destroying the hospital with flame throwers were filmed here. On 15 March, filming finally moved to Babelsberg Studios. The first scene shot at the studio was the scene in which Szpilman witnesses a resistance mounted by the Jews from the Ghetto, which is eventually ended by the Nazis. The scene was complex and technically demanding as it involved various stunts and explosives. Filming at the studios ended on 26 March and moved to Warsaw on 29 March. The rundown district of Praga was chosen for filming because of its abundance of original buildings. The art department built onto these original buildings, re-creating World War II–era Poland with signs and posters from the period. Additional filming also took place around Warsaw. The Umschlagplatz scene where Szpilman, his family and hundreds of other Jews wait to be taken to the extermination camps was filmed at the National Defence University in Warsaw.

Principal photography ended in July 2001, and was followed by months of post-production, which took place in Paris, France.

Critical reception

The film received extremely positive reviews from critics and Brody's performance was met with near universal acclaim. As of 14 January 2011, The Pianist holds a score of 96% on review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes. With over 171,000 votes and an average of 8.5, it currently holds the 51st place in the IMDB top 250. Metacritic rates the movie as 85% based on 40 reviews.

Roger Ebert noted that "perhaps that impassive quality reflects what Polanski wants to say... By showing Szpilman as a survivor but not a fighter or a hero—as a man who does all he can to save himself, but would have died without enormous good luck and the kindness of a few non-Jews—Polanski is reflecting... his own deepest feelings: that he survived, but need not have, and that his mother died and left a wound that had never healed."

Home release

The film was released on DVD on 26 May 2003 in a double-sided disc Special Edition DVD, with the movie on one side and special features on the other.. Some Bonus Material included a making-of, interviews with Brody, Polanski, and Harwood, and clips of Szpilman playing the piano. Polish DVD edition included audio commentary track (in Polish) by production designer Starski and director of photography Edelman.

Optimum Home Entertainment released The Pianist to the European market on Blu-ray as part of their StudioCanal Collection on 13 September 2010 and this is the film's second release on Blu-ray. The first was troublesome due to issues with subtitles: the initial BD lacked subtitles for spoken German dialogue. Optimum later rectified this but the initial release also lacked notable special features. The StudioCanal Collection version includes an extensive Behind the Scenes look as well as several interviews with the makers of the film and Szpilman's relatives.

Music

Further information: The Pianist (soundtrack)

• The piano piece heard at the beginning of the film is Chopin's Nocturne in C-sharp minor Lento con gran espressione, Op. posth.
• The piano piece that is heard being played by a next door neighbour while Szpilman was in hiding at an apartment was Chopin's Mazurka in A minor, Op. 17, No. 4.
• The piano music heard in the abandoned house when Szpilman had just discovered a hiding place in the attic was the Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven. It would later be revealed that German officer Hosenfeld was the pianist. The German composition juxtaposed with the mainly Polish/Chopin selection of Szpilman.
• The piano piece played when Szpilman is confronted by Hosenfeld is Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G minor, Op. 23. Also, the version played in the movie was shortened. The entire piece lasts 9–10 minutes.
• The cello piece heard at the middle of the film, played by Dorota, is the Prelude from Bach's Cello Suite No. 1.
• The piano piece heard at the end of the film, played with an orchestra, is Chopin's Grande Polonaise brillante, Op. 22.
• Shots of Szpilman's hands playing the piano in close-up were provided by Polish classical pianist Janusz Olejniczak (b. 1952), who also performed on the soundtrack.
• Since Polanski wanted the film to be as realistic as possible, any scene showing Brody playing was actually his playing voiced over by recordings provided by Janusz Olejniczak. In order for Brody's playing to look like it was at the level of Władysław Szpilman's, he spent many months prior to and during the filming practicing so that his keystrokes on the piano would convince viewers that Brody himself was playing. It was never specified whether or not it was actually Adrien Brody playing at certain points in the film, such as the beginning where Władysław Szpilman's playing is interrupted by German bombing.

Awards and nominations

Wins

• Academy Award for Best Actor – Adrien Brody
• Academy Award for Best Director – Roman Polanski
• Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay – Ronald Harwood
• Palme d'Or, 2002 Cannes Film Festival
• BAFTA Award for Best Film
• BAFTA Award for Best Direction – Roman Polanski
• César Award for Best Actor
• César Award for Best Director
• César Award for Best Film
• César Award for Best Music Written for a Film
• César Award for Best Cinematography
• César Award for Best Production Design
• César Award for Best Sound
• Goya Award for Best European Film

Nominations

• Academy Award for Best Cinematography – Paweł Edelman
• Academy Award for Best Costume Design – Anna B. Sheppard
• Academy Award for Film Editing – Hervé de Luze
• Academy Award for Best Picture
• BAFTA Award for Best Cinematography – Paweł Edelman
• BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role – Adrien Brody
• BAFTA Award for Best Adapted Screenplay – Ronald Harwood
• BAFTA Award for Best Sound – Jean-Marie Blondel, Dean Humphreys, Gérard Hardy

See also

• Władysław Szpilman, pianist, composer, and author of The Pianist (memoir).
• World War II – German invasion of Poland and Warsaw (1939); Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in the Jewish Warsaw Ghetto (1943); and the later, larger Warsaw Uprising (1944).
• Wilm Hosenfeld, German officer and pianist.
• List of Holocaust films
• History of the Jews in Poland
• Defiance (2008 film)
• Uprising (film)

External links

• Official website
• The Pianist at the Internet Movie Database
• The Pianist at Box Office Mojo
• The Pianist at Rotten Tomatoes
• United States Holocaust Memorial Museum – Szpilman's Warsaw: The History behind The Pianist

Awards
Preceded by Amélie	Goya Award for Best European Film 2002	Succeeded by Good Bye Lenin!