The Pianist: not what you'd expect...and that's a good thing

I was put off from seeing The Pianist until I was forced to watch it this weekend.

Not because the movie is a downer, but I didn't think I would be able to handle yet another feel-good but brutal drama of Nazi Germany. For whatever reason, I had the distinct impression that the story was about his playing music for halls full of German soldiers to escape being shipped off to the death camps, and sadly, in this day and age, the whole WWII era is exploited as a means of showing we really aren't too bad after all. It's almost like MLK Jr. day.

And I'm sorry I felt that way about this movie.

It's not about a Jewish person being forced to do monkey tricks to stay alive or to smile in the face of adversity. No. This is a simple document of how a well respected pianist went from being someone to being a louse-infested and starving victim of a social system.

Even when he is holed up in hiding, there is still drama as he peeks out his window to watch the war and chaos unraveling around him.

Which leads me to my favorite part about Roman Polanski films: I love the street scenes in every movie that I've seen. I don't know what it is except that even when the most dramatic events are unraveling, he doesn't use quick cuts and intense close-ups. Everything plays out in an all-encompassing long-shot of the entire area. If you know how Chinatown ends, then you hopefully will agree that it can't get much more compelling than that. Usually, I don't think too deeply about things like that, but I find it absolutely compelling that it draws my mind and my thoughts towards thinking about drama in a new way.

Either way, this movie is new and exciting and puts a new face to the lives affected by social upheaval….and swimming throughout the battles and starvation, he's left to torment in the silence of not being able to play the music he loves.