September 1, is the 80th anniversary of the beginning of the combined Nazi and Soviet invasion of Poland, which marked the start of World War II. The film's score consists of new music by Polish composer Wojciech Kilar and significant moments from some of the piano works of Poland's most famous musical son, Frederic Chopin. The score won a French Cesar Award, but all told, the film received only a few nominations for Best Music. Why did this film about a noted concert pianist and titled The Pianist not receive more hardware for its music?
The answer might have to do with the story of the film itself. Poland is especially proud of the Polish-born Chopin, who is best known for his extremely virtuosic piano music.
Including Chopin's piano music in this initial scene is much more than an obvious move. It firmly establishes the setting of the film in Poland β specifically in Warsaw, the nation's capital β and in the world of a gifted pianist. The scene also sends a message of Polish nationalism at the dawn of a story about the war that, as has been said, Poland would come to lose twice β first to the Nazis, and later to the Soviets. The Nazi invasion of Poland on September 1, turns the lives of Szpilman, his parents and his three siblings upside down.
They are forced to adhere to new anti-Semitic policies, to leave behind most of their possessions and to move into the section of Warsaw the Nazis designate as the city's new Jewish district, which would come to be known as the Warsaw Ghetto. To alleviate his family's poverty and hunger, Szpilman sells his piano for a pittance. The family is marched with the city's other Jews to take up residence in the Jewish district. In the lot below the window of their new dwelling, the family see German workers building the wall that will separate the ghetto from the rest of Warsaw.
The music that accompanies the family's trek to the Warsaw Ghetto - Wojciech Kilar's version of likely a Jewish folk tune β takes on an ominous tone. The visuals cut to a crowd scene in which a group of Jews stand near streetcar tracks. A klezmer band β a powerful musical signifier of eastern European Jewish culture β appears onscreen and in the soundtrack, and Nazi soldiers order pairs of Jews to dance together, bidding the musicians to play faster and faster and egging on the dancers to keep up with the music.
