Wladyslaw Szpilman, is a well renowned pianist and at the time of the Nazi invasion of Poland he is playing Chopin on a Warsaw radio station when the first German bombs fall. Szpilman's family who is quite prosperous and seemingly secure are faced with harsh realities of life under the new regimen as the Nazi noose tightens. His family takes heart from reports that England and France have declared war; surely the Nazis will soon be defeated and life will return to normal, but it is not to be that simple nor easy. Szpilman and his family our forced out of their homes and away from their secure life to be relocated in the Jewish part of town that the Nazi’s have created that is no more then a Ghetto. There they find hunger and death everywhere as the Nazi’s slowly wipe out the Jewish population. A Jewish police force is formed to enforce Nazi regulations, and Szpilman is offered a place on it; he refuses, but a good friend, who joins, later saves his life by taking him off a train bound for the death camps. But now he has been separated from his family and everyone he knows and finds himself all alone in a harsh brutal world that is Nazi rule. He finds work carrying bricks to build more walls between the Jews and the Gentiles but he cannot keep pace with such a brutal job and luckily someone helps him get an easier job where he finds himself helping to smuggle in weapons for a hopeful Jewish rebellion. But nothing is easy as he is faced with one atrocity after another and is beginning to give up hope for freedom and the right to be treated as a human being once more

The movie is a dark and sometimes slow walk through the horrors that were committed against the Jews during World War II. Roman Polanski the director of the movie was a Jew in Poland during this time and only escaped death in the camps by his father pushing him through a fence. Much of this movie deals with his own experiences and horrors he witnessed. It does not gloss over some of the more horrible elements of the war and gives a true representation of what it was like to be a Jew in Poland in the early 1940’s. The movie makes no pretense at any type of action and I solely a drama that draws you in with its incredibly sad and true stories. The fact that the movie has little to no action can make the movie a little slow at times but this fault is easily conquered by the wonderful drama of the movie. Adrien Brody makes you feel for his plight and wonder and worry what is going to happen to him next. You cannot help but feel sickened by the atrocities committed nor can you not help but feel sadness for all those involved. The movie does have a bright spot in the dreary telling of its story and that comes from the help of a German officer who helps Szpilman and possibly saves his life when most of his comrades would have just executed him. If you liked Schindlers List you will like this movie as it deals with a lot of the same subject matter.
4 stars out of 5