I didn't see this film for years after it's release based solely on the title. I didn't even investigate what it was about because of the title. I can't really say what it was about the name that bored me into not ever even checking it out but that's what happened. Years later out of boredom i ended up seeing it and wow, just wow.

You see, the movie doesn't really even have very much to do with pianos, that just happens to be the profession of the main character Władysław Szpilman (played by Adrien Brody - and yes, i copy/pasted the name) who is a Jewish Polish person at a time that it was really inconvenient to be either of those things. The film starts with him playing music in a radio studio when the city and the station is bombed by invading Nazi forces. Realizing that Poland is going to lose, Szpilman and his family are briefly elated to discover on a radio broadcast that England and The United States have declared war on Germany, however their joy is quickly turned to horror as the aid does not arrive.

As the brutality of the Nazis escalates, Szpilman sees his world turned upside down as all Jews are moved to Warsaw ghettos and things get continually worse. I won't get into specifics because the film is just wonderful in its storytelling and the tragic displays are best left for those who will watch the film.

Roman Polanski had a particular interest in this project because he is actually a Holocaust survivor and hid in a Polish farmer's barn until the end of the war - only then being reunited with his father, who nearly died in the concentration camps.

Nearly 1400 people tried out for the lead role and Polanski didn't like any of them. He finally found Adrien Brody who just kills it in this movie. This surprised me because for whatever reasons I didn't really rate him as an actor up to this point.

You see, Władysław Szpilman is no hero. He's actually quite a coward, he is not a fighter and gets by on the generosity of others and sometimes just wild luck. The continuous tragedy that he faces is truly heartbreaking and this is compounded by the fact that this movie is based on real events and Władysław Szpilman is a real person.

I believe this is about as close to perfect as a movie can be. It is an emotional true story that is just beautifully done. I believe this is the best movie about Nazi Germany and the Holocaust in existence.