The Pianist [Hong Kong] [Blu-ray]

Director: Roman Polanski Roman Polanski

Overview

Filmmaker Roman Polanski, who as a boy growing up in Poland watched while the Nazis devastated his country during World War II, directed this downbeat drama based on the true story of a privileged musician who spent five years struggling against the Nazi occupation of Warsaw. Wladyslaw Szpilman (Adrien Brody) is a gifted classical pianist born to a wealthy Jewish family in Poland. The Szpilmans have a large and comfortable flat in Warsaw which Wladyslaw shares with his mother and father (Maureen Lipman and Frank Finlay), his sisters Halina and Regina (Jessica Kate Meyer and Julia Rayner), and his brother, Henryk (Ed Stoppard). While Wladyslaw and his family are aware of the looming presence of German forces and Hitler's designs on Poland, they're convinced that the Nazis are a menace which will pass, and that England and France will step forward to aid Poland in the event of a real crisis. Wladyslaw's na?vet? is shattered when a German bomb rips through a radio studio while he performs a recital for broadcast. During the early stages of the Nazi occupation, as a respected artist, he still imagines himself above the danger, using his pull to obtain employment papers for his father and landing a supposedly safe job playing piano in a restaurant. But as the German grip tightens upon Poland, Wladyslaw and his family are selected for deportation to a Nazi concentration camp. Refusing to face a certain death, Wladyslaw goes into hiding in a comfortable apartment provided by a friend. However, when his benefactor goes missing, Wladyslaw is left to fend for himself and he spends the next several years dashing from one abandoned home to another, desperate to avoid capture by German occupation troops. The Pianist was based on the memoir of the same name by the real-life Wladyslaw Szpilman; the book was first published in 1946 as Death of a City, but was banned by Polish Communist officials and went out of print until 1998, when a new edition was issued as The Pianist.

Product Details

Release Date:	06/22/2010
UPC:	4895033770183
Original Release:	2002
Source:	SUPER D INDEPENDENT DIST.
Language:	English
Sales rank:	44,464

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Adrien Brody	Wladyslaw Szpilman,Actor
Emilia Fox	Dorota
Thomas Kretschmann	Capt. Wilm Hosenfeld
Micha¿ Zebrowski	Jurek
Ed Stoppard	Henryk
Maureen Lipman	The Mother
Frank Finlay	The Father
Jessica Kate Meyer	Halina
Julia Rayner	Regina
Ruth Platt	Janina
Wanja Mues	SS Officer who Slaps the Father
Richard Ridings	Mr. Lipa
Nomi Sharron	Woman with the Feather
Anthony Milner	Man Waiting to Cross
Lucie Skeaping	Street Musician,Street Musician
Ben Harlan	Street Musician
Thomas Lawinky	Schutzpolizei
Roy Smiles	Itzak Heller
Paul Bradley	Yehuda
Daniel Caltagirone	Majorek
Andrzej Blumenfeld	Benek
Darian Wawer	Child at the Wall
Zbigniew Zamachowski	Client with Change
Lejb Fogelman	Client with Change
Detlev Von Wangenheim	SS Officer
Popek	Rubenstein
Zofia Czerwinska	Woman with Soup
Emilio Fernandez	the Soup Snatcher
Udo Kroschwald	Schultz
Uwe Rathsam	SS Officer Addressed by Woman
Joanna Brodzik	Woman Addressing SS officer
Katarzyna Bargielowska	Wailing Woman
Maja Ostaszewska	Woman with Child
John Bennett	Dr. Ehrlich
Cyril Shaps	Mr. Grun
Wojciech Smolarz	Boy with Sweets
Lech Mackiewicz	Fellow Worker
Frank Michael Kobe	SS Officer who Shoots Benek
Torsten Flach	Zig Zag
Peter Rappengluck	SS Officer Making Speech
Ronan Vibert	Janina's Husband
Krzysztof Pieczynski	Gebczynski
Katarzyna Figura	the Neighbor
Valentine Pelka	Dorota's Husband
Andrew Tiernan	Szalas
Tom Strauss	Dr. Luczak
Cezary Kosinski	Lednicki
Nina Franoszek	Actor
Joachim Paul Assböck	un autre policier
Axel Prahl	un soldat allemand
Popeck	Rubenstein
Wojciech Kilar	Composer

Technical Credits

Ronald Harwood

Wladyslaw Szpilman

Ronald Harwood	Screenwriter
Robert Benmussa	Producer
Timothy Burrill	Executive Producer,Producer
Jim Dowdall	Stunts
Celestia Fox	Casting
Christian Kunstler	Special Effects
Alister Mazzotti	Special Effects
Henning Molfenter	Executive Producer,Producer
Roman Polanski	Producer,Director
Lew Rywin	Executive Producer,Producer
Alain Sarde	Producer
Hans Seck	Special Effects
Kazimierz Wroblewski	Special Effects
Wladyslaw Szpilman	Screenwriter
Adrian Lorberth	Special Effects
Gérard Hardy	Sound Editor
Udo Harnach	Stunts
Heta Mantscheff	Casting
Jean-Marie Blondel	Sound/Sound Designer

Editorial Reviews

One of the very few nondocumentary movies about Jewish life and death under the Nazis that can be called definitive.