The Pianist |  | Director: Roman Polanski
Actors: Adrien Brody, Frank Finlay, Thomas Kretschmann, Maureen Lipman, Katarzyna Figura
Studio: Universal Studios
Category: DVD
List Price: $14.98
Buy New: $7.41
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Seller: -importcds
Rating:  421 reviews
Sales Rank: 2239
Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Dubbed)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Region: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 150 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.3 x 0.4
MPN: D30885D
UPC: 025193088529
EAN: 0025193088529
ASIN: B000FVQLRA
Theatrical Release Date: 2002
Release Date: August 22, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com
Winner of the prestigious Golden Palm award at the 2002 Cannes film festival, The Pianist is the film that Roman Polanski was born to direct. A childhood survivor of Nazi-occupied Poland, Polanski was uniquely suited to tell the story of Wladyslaw Szpilman, a Polish Jew and concert pianist (played by Adrien Brody) who witnessed the Nazi invasion of Warsaw, miraculously eluded the Nazi death camps, and survived throughout World War II by hiding among the ruins of the Warsaw ghetto. Unlike any previous dramatization of the Nazi holocaust, The Pianist steadfastly maintains its protagonist's singular point of view, allowing Polanski to create an intimate odyssey on an epic wartime scale, drawing a direct parallel between Szpilman's tenacious, primitive existence and the wholesale destruction of the city he refuses to abandon. Uncompromising in its physical and emotional authenticity, The Pianist strikes an ultimate note of hope and soulful purity. As with Schindler's List, it's one of the greatest films ever made about humanity's darkest chapter. --Jeff Shannon
Product Description
Nominated for 7 Academy Awards including Best Picture and winner of 3 The Pianist stars Oscar winner Adrien Brody in the true-life story of brilliant pianist and composer Wladyslaw Szpilman the most acclaimed young musician of his time until his promising career was interrupted by the onset of World War II. This powerful ultimately triumphant film follows Szpilman s heroic and inspirational journey of survival with the unlikely help from a sympathetic German officer (Thomas Kretschmann). A truly unforgettable epic testifying to both the power of hope and the resiliency of the human spirit The Pianist is a miraculous tale of survival masterfully brought to life by visionary filmmaker Roman Polanski in his most personal movie ever.System Requirements:Running Time: 150 MinutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 025193088529 Manufacturer No: 62030885
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 421
 Excellent piece of work February 22, 2010
Leif E. Johnson (California)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Remarkable true story of courage and resistance during the terrible days of Nazi reign of terror. This film should be seen by all. I show it in my U.S. history class when we study the Holocaust. It is a great way to help educate students about what happened and how one can survive even the worst of times. Roman Polanski is up there with Spielberg with their great contribution to film and history.
 a note on Polish-Jewish relations February 21, 2010
Remigius (Ireland)
This is not a review, just an answer to some of the reviews here. The movie is obviously worth watching.
This movie ends in a happy end for Szpilman, but it wasn't a happy end for Poland. After Germans, came the Soviets, and perhaps paradoxically lots of Jews who survived the WW2 in Poland joined the oppression apparatus of the communist regime (cause the Soviets didn't trust the Poles in this role?). A number of show trials followed during which many Home Army officers were tortured and sentenced over absurd charges - this list of victims includes Witold Pilecki, Kazimierz Moczarski, Emil Fieldorf. The communist perpetrators of many of those court crimes were Polish Jews: Helena Wolinska, Julia Brystygier, Salomon Morel, Jozef Swiatlo, Jakub Berman etc. When they finally fell out of favour of the system, most of them emigrated, and what's shamelss and absurd - they started refering to Poland as "the Jew-hating country of Auschwitz and Treblinka", at the same time accepting retirement money from Poland. This is one of the factors that fueled anitsemitic feelings in contemporary Poland.
I also notice one accusation against the Poles that keeps recuring in the reviews: that "Poles didn't want to save their Jews". The answer is that Poles couldn't save themselves. The side effect of all those Holocaust books and movies is that the world forgot that Auschwitz was originally built for Poles, and while Germans started building ghettos for Jews, they either executed Poles on the spot or send them to slave labour. Any ressistance operations were met with unproportional retaliations against the civilian population - for exampe the assasination of SS commander Franz Kutschera, approved and carried out by the Home Army, resulted in the execution of 100 Polish hostages.
The situation under Soviet occupation 1939-1941 was actually worse for Poles than it was for Jews - at least it was Jews who warmly welcomed the Soviets and, most probably under the communist illusions, helped them select families for deportation.
In total, the number of Polish non-Jewish victims of WW2 is comparable to the number of Polish Jewish victims. Those accusations are another factor that fuels antisemitic feelings in Poland, but perhaps this is the intention?
Finally, vote for Applebaum, no joke here, she seems intelligent! That is, vote Sikorski ;)
A very moving movie. February 11, 2010
A. Nadeau (arizona)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I am always moved by holocaust stories, but some are better told than others. This is a very well performed script based on a true story. It is VERY well done.
Adrian Brody: Total Immersion January 23, 2010
Michael D. Witt (Reno,NV)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is not a movie to watch if you want mindless entertainment. It is a gut-wrenching depiction of the most horrible atrocities in human history. Adrian Brody totally immerses himself in the title role of a Polish pianist who somehow managed to survive,against overwhelming odds, the horrors of the Holocaust. If this story doesn't put your problems in perspective,nothing will.
Wanting to turn away from the horrific views of all this brutality, I found myself staring in disbelief at the brutality of the Nazi soldiers "acting under orders." These willful acts of violence display humanity at its absolute worse. Yet, the determination of this young pianist to survive shows the inner strength of the human spirit to overcome. Hopefully none of us will ever be pushed to such limits but this movie makes us aware of the inner strength that lies within us.
Okay... January 18, 2010
David Pleiss
Can we go ahead and not interject our very narrow modern political opinions into a historical tale about another government and country, rockygreen? thank you.
This is a great movie about another place in time, concerning a government that was not run by officials who were elected regularly by the people of the country. These citizens had no say in the political process, and could not change things if they didn't like them. And there were no human rights, because the people weren't in charge; they couldn't be electing and re-electing when the leaders didn't suit them. The citizens of this time could not popularly elect, by their own will, a candidate whose main political platform was to fix the insurance fiasco in a democratic country. :)
Showing reviews 1-5 of 421
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