FROM THE MOVIE THE PIANIST I REALLY NEED HELP
I. Survival
What guides Szpilman’s response in these moments of crisis?
1. Notice how Jews are treated
· What is Szpilman’s response when he finds that Jews are forbidden in a restaurant? How does his
· behavior contrast with Dorota’s, a non-Jew?
· What happens to Wladyik’s Father when he confronts two German soldiers?
· How do the Germans humiliate the Jews? (This scene is not made up. Szpilman described it exactly)
· How do the film scenes in the ghetto reflect what you have understood from text or
Documentaries? Did director Polanski capture the horrors of the ghetto?
(The scene with the man in the wheelchair is recounted in Szpilman’s book.)
· How does the film convey the hunger and desperation in the ghetto?
2. When Szpilman learns that his brother has been taken for deportation to a forced labor camp, he begs
Itzak Heller, a Jewish police for help. Notice how Wladyik’s and Henryk’s attitudes differ.

3. Round-up and Deportation.
· Why does Wladyik believe that his siblings decision to leave the ghetto with their parents is “stupid?”
· What does Wladyik’s father do with the last bit of money that he has?
· How id Wladyk removed from the transport? What does this say about Itzak Heller?

II. Action, Hiding, Rescuers and Perpetrators: Warsaw was also the site of the most effective attempt by Jews to strike back at the forces of the Holocaust, the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (9 April 1943, on the eve of Passover to 16 May 1943 ) , in which a few hundred Jewish fighters, armed mainly with pistols and homemade grenades, defended the Ghetto against Nazi tanks and artillery for nearly a month.

1. How does Wladyik resist the Germans?
2. How does Wladyik survive in hiding?
3. To get a sense of the Warsaw ghetto uprising, look through Wladyik’s eyes as he watches the
conflicts from the window of his hiding place?

4. The Pianist shows non-Jews as rescuers, bystanders and perpetrators. Give examples of each.

III. In one of the final scenes, Wladyik is exposed by Wehrmacht (army) officer William Hosenfeld.
What saves Wladyik and how does he almost get killed by the Russians?
How does Wladyik attempt to return the favor?