The Pianist’s European Jews: Endurance and Adversity
After occupying Poland, the Nazis ordered that all Jews wear Star of David badges to show their superiority. It was intended to show the Jews’ inferiority to Aryans and help German citizens to identify subordinate Jews. If the Nazis found out, they would punish you with severe consequences, the worst being your execution. Wladyslaw Szpilman is opposed to the Star of David. This includes his brother Henryk, a dissident who refuses any concessions to the Nazis. Wladyslaw is less reckless because he understands the implications of his actions. The Nazis made another attempt to subdue Poland’s Jewish population by confining them into the Warsaw Ghetto. The Warsaw Ghetto, despite being one of the most populous ghettos in Nazi Germany during World War II, was still a very large one. The Germans did not care about the suffering of the Jews in the ghetto and as the film shows, they brutally assaulted some denizens (like Wladyslaw’s young boy who was beaten and then killed by Wladyslaw). The Nazis tried to conquer the Jews by sending them to concentration camp. Anybody questioning the logic would be shot to death. The Jews were kept in very small spaces while waiting for trains, just like the ghettoes. The Jews were then sent to the “showers” to be killed with noxious gas (Zyklon B), or worked to death in the concentration camps. Although the camp conditions are not shown fully in the film, it is probable that Szpilman and his family were subject to these terrible conditions.
Itzhak and other Jews were placed in high places in the ghetto by Nazis because of the large Jewish population in Warsaw. The Nazis could not keep order with the few hundred thousand Jews in ghetto. The ghetto needed to be stable and productive. They made it possible for Jews to take over the day-to-day operations of the Ghetto. This included packaging food, construction, security, and security. There are scenes throughout the film that show the Jews not reacting aggressively to Nazi misdeeds. The Nazi officers charmed a few Jews with their dance moves while they waited in the Warsaw Ghetto line. The Jews found it extremely awkward, but they didn’t retaliate as the Nazis would just execute them along with other Jews. Szpilman, who was living in Warsaw Ghetto at the time, would be randomly chosen by the Nazis to execute. The execution line was filled with Jews who knew that resisting would only make it more difficult. While the Nazis were dangerous and armed, they were actually defenseless. It is likely that the Jews believed resistance would be futile unless they gathered masses of people, which they did later in Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The Nazis would exert an apparently inexorable power over Jews, and they would continue to disorient them.
