‘The Pianist’ is work of art historically, musically

Jeff Klemzak of La Crescenta owns a roofing business.

“The Pianist,” Roman Polanski’s tale of one man’s journey through

the Warsaw Ghetto during the Nazi occupation, is one of the finest

films I’ve seen in quite some time. The story is told with a richness

and depth that carries the viewer on an emotional see-saw, from the

heights of superbly performed classical music to the depths of Nazi

depravity.

Adrien Brody plays Wladyslaw Szpilman, a famous concert pianist

whose work was familiar to Polish listeners in the days just prior to

World War II. Szpilman and his family are forced by the Nazis from

their comfortable Warsaw home into spare and unheated quarters in the

living hell of the newly created Jewish ghetto. Later, Szpilman

becomes separated from his family and is hidden in the war-torn city

by a network of friends while the Germans are systematically

deporting the ghetto residents to the death camps.

Shot almost entirely in Warsaw, “The Pianist” is a technical

masterpiece, even going so far as filming crowd scenes in sepia tone

to give the effects of aging photographs.

Scenes of Szpilman eating uncooked grain and drinking putrid water

to survive his ordeal and an exploding soundtrack of cannon fire and

Chopin concertos cleverly draws the viewer into this finely crafted

film.

“The Pianist” is rated R.