"The Pianist:" Brutality and Beauty

Until several of my freshman students began talking to me about it, I'd forgotten all about the movie "The Pianist," which was released in 2002 and won the Palme D'Or.  My students had seen the parts of this movie in eighth grade, during a quarter-long study of the Holocaust and were deeply moved by it. I'd never seen the movie and wanted to be able to talk with them about it.

This is a brutal, magnificent movie. It speaks of the human spirit and its struggle to survive. Based largely on the true story of classical pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman, it gives witness to the life of  gifted Polish pianist, a Jew, who managed to survive in Warsaw during World War II while hundreds of thousands of Jews were exterminated in death camps. Szpilman is portrayed by actor Adrien Brody, then 29, who won an Academy Award for his work.

"A Year of The Quiet Sun:" Happiness in Suffering

Last night I sat on our sofa, watching this luminous, haunting film on my MacBook via NetFlix streaming. Occasionally, I would pause the movie to show my husband an image: "Look at the way he films their faces." "Look at the landscape." And sometimes, I would pause just to catch my breath. Truly, this is one of the loveliest, most heart-wrenching and beautiful of films.

The setting for the Oscar-worthy "A Year of the Quiet Sun" is Poland just after World War II. An American private, played by the dashing Scott Wilson, falls head over heels for a Polish war widow, whom he encounters as she paints in an abandoned car.  Neither speaks the other's language and yet they manage to communicate and to fall in love