Summary
We see documentary footage of Warsaw in 1939. We then see a man, Władysław Szpilman, playing the piano. He is recording in a studio, when suddenly, a bomb goes off outside. As rubble and debris fall from the ceiling, Szpilman continues to play, as his recording engineer motions for him to stop. He continues to play as conditions worsen and he can no longer play anymore.
Downstairs in the lobby, Szpilman runs into a woman, Dorota, who tells him she came to the studio to hear his playing. "I am Jurek's sister," she tells him, as Jurek tells her to leave and that she can write him a fan letter later.
Later, Szpilman arrives home to his family, where he is greeted with relief. They tell him that they have to go out of Warsaw, since "all able-bodied men must leave the city, go across the river." Szpilman says he isn't leaving, and his sister, Halina, says that she's going to stay as well. "If I'm going to die, I prefer to die in my own home, staying put," Szpilman says.
Szpilman's brother, Henryk, turns up the radio. The news reporter announces that the English have declared war on Nazi Germany, and that France will join them soon. "Poland is no longer alone," the reporter says, and the Szpilman family rejoices. That night, the family gathers around the dinner table and Szpilman's father raises a toast to the fact that all will be well.
The next day, the Szpilman men watch as Nazi forces march into the city center. At home, Szpilman's father counts their money (around 5,000 zlotys), as his daughter reads an ordinance that says that "Jews will be allowed to keep a maximum of 2,000 zlotys in their homes." The family discusses what to do with the money, since they certainly cannot trust German banks. Halina suggests they hide the money under the flower pots, but Szpilman's father says they should put the money in the table leg, like during the last war.
Henryk is pessimistic, suggesting that the Germans will go into any house and take what they please. He then suggests they put their valuables on top of the table, and that if they put them in full view, the Germans will never find them. Szpilman offers his own plan: to roll up the bills and slide them into a violin. An argument erupts among the family members, when Regina, Szpilman's sister who is a lawyer, suggests they put the watch under the flowerpots and the money in the violin.
Szpilman calls Jurek about work, but Jurek tells him that the radio station has been completely shut down. Jurek insists that Szpilman will find other work with his talent, but Szpilman does not actually want to talk about his career. Instead, he wants to go on a date with Dorota.
The scene shifts to Szpilman and Dorota walking down the street talking. "No one plays Chopin like you," she tells him. Dorota tells him that she is also a musician who just finished conservatory, where she played the cello. They arrive at a coffee shop, but a sign on the door tells them that the business does not allow Jews. Dorota is upset by it, and wants to go in to complain, but Szpilman warns her not to. She suggests they go to the park, but Szpilman informs her that Jews are not allowed in the park.
Szpilman suggests they just stand and talk, asking her about her favorite composer. He suggests that she learn Chopin's Cello Sonata. When he offers to accompany her on the piano for it, she tells him he is wonderful.
The scene shifts to Szpilman's father reading the paper to his family, which states that Jews are to start wearing "visible emblems" when outside, and applies to all Jews over 12. The Szpilmans discuss the fact that they do not want to wear the emblem, and that they will refuse.
Later, as Szpilman's father walks down the street, two Nazis stop him, and scold him for not bowing when he passed them. One of them strikes him, hard, knocking him to the ground, and he continues walking. The Nazi then tells him to walk in the street instead of on the sidewalk.
One night, when Szpilman is playing the piano, Halina brings him a newspaper article outlining that Jews are going to be placed in a ghetto in Warsaw. Their mother cries in her room about the fact that they only have 20 zlotys left to spend.
The next day, a man comes to buy the piano for 2,000, even though Regina insists that it is worth more. Henryk attacks the buyer suddenly, but Szpilman insists that the man take the piano.
As the Jews are moved to the ghetto, Dorota comes to speak to Szpilman, and tells him that she's worried, because the Nazis arrested Jurek. "It won't last long," Szpilman insists, and says his goodbyes.
When they arrive at their new apartment, the Szpilmans realize they must share rooms, as Halina calls them over to the window. Outside, workers are building a brick wall to separate the Jewish section of town from the rest of the city.
We see the poor conditions in the ghetto, as Szpilman and Henryk go into town to try and sell their books. Henryk tells him that he sold Dostoyevsky's The Idiot for 3 zlotys. A woman approaches Szpilman asking if he's seen her husband, and they walk towards a crowd gathering, waiting to cross the street, as a klezmer band plays nearby.
A Nazi pulls some Jews out of the crowd and forces them to dance for him, a humiliating display. Suddenly, the way is clear, and barriers go up, so that the Jews can cross the street.
When the Szpilman brothers return home, Itzhak Heller is waiting for them. Heller is in the jewelry business and is recruiting workers to work for the Jewish police in Warsaw, as millions of Jews are moving to the city. He offers for Wladek to join the police jazz band, but Szpilman says he has work.
We see Szpilman playing the piano at a restaurant. Suddenly, a man gambling at a nearby table makes a request that he stop playing the piano, so he obliges. When the man is finished flipping coins, Szpilman goes back to playing.
Szpilman visits a friend who is a newspaper journalist, and tells him that he wants to work against the Nazis, but his friend insists, "You musicians don't make good conspirators. You're too...too musical." Szpilman tells him that the Nazis are cleansing the city of undesirables, as a man named Majorek walks in. Szpilman's friend tells him that he is distributing his newspaper around the city, in order to start an uprising against the government, and that Majorek hides them in his underwear to put in bathrooms.
As he is walking home, Szpilman sees a boy climbing under the wall of the ghetto to get to the Jewish side, but getting beaten by a German in the process. He pulls the boy out, but the boy is dead.
At dinner, Mrs. Szpilman insists that the family not talk about anything bad, and Henryk tells the family that a surgeon they know was commissioned to perform surgery inside the ghetto, but was shot, along with the patient, by a Nazi. "Isn't that a laugh?" Henryk says. "That's not funny," Szpilman says to his brother, and Henryk makes fun of his tie and the fact that he works at the restaurant. His father says that he blames everything on American Jews, for not convincing the American government to declare war on Germany.
Analysis
Before we know any specifics about the narrative, we see a compelling and fascinating juxtaposition, between the beauty of music and the vagaries of war. Wladyslaw Szpilman is barely halfway through recording a beautiful piece of classical music on the piano, when a bomb goes off outside and the recording studio is filled with debris and dust. He continues to play, determined to make beautiful music, even in the face of outright war and squalor. This image, of the determined musician playing through a bombing, sets the tone for the film, showing us that it is about beauty and music cutting through the difficulties and horror of fascism and violence.
Indeed, Szpilman is not only a man who is committed to his musicianship, but he is also committed to his faithfulness to Poland, his home country. When he returns home to the news that all of the Polish men must leave home given the invasion by the Nazis, Szpilman is rebellious and insists on staying home to face his fate in familiar surroundings. "If I'm going to die, I prefer to die in my own home," he says. Szpilman's single-mindedness—the same quality that leads him to keep recording a song even while the very studio in which he is recording is getting bombed—extends to his patriotism and sense of home, as well.
Szpilman's patriotism is tested by the incursion of the Nazis, who cultivate a tide of antisemitism in the city. While on a date with Dorota, Szpilman finds that they cannot go into a public coffee shop, as Jews are not allowed. When she suggests they go to the park, he informs her that Jews are not allowed in the park either. Dorota is shocked to hear that such restrictions have been placed, and we see that Szpilman's options as a Polish Jew are severely limited by German occupation. Szpilman, who is an acclaimed pianist and upstanding member of society, is being subjected to dehumanizing and bigoted treatment by the current governing body.
Life only gets worse for Szpilman when his whole family must move to a ghetto together, where they face poor conditions and small quarters. Not only are Jews singled out within Warsaw, but they are moved into a contained environment, completely separating them from the rest of the city. We watch as the Szpilmans fall from their comfortable life in a large apartment in the city to squalor and desperation. Everything they have built is snatched up from under them.
The horrors of the Nazis not only divide the Jews of Warsaw from the rest of the city, but also create divisions within the Szpilman family itself. Henryk becomes more and more radicalized by his experience as a Jew in the ghetto, and looks down on Szpilman's insistence on playing piano at a restaurant in the ghetto, filled with people he deems apathetic. The two brothers are driven apart by the difficulty of living in the ghetto, and the family itself can barely find anything pleasant to talk about over a meal, as conditions have gotten more and more bleak.
