The Pianist, Today
Over the weekend, my wife, Terrie, and I watched The Pianist, a 2002 film that won Adrien Brody his first Academy Award for Best Actor. The movie is based on the autobiography of Władysław Szpilman, a renowned pianist and a Jew, and his harrowing story of survival across six years of Nazi-occupied Warsaw, Poland.
As I rewatched the movie, I found myself growing angrier by the minute. The cruelty of the Nazis. The way so many Polish citizens looked the other way or even joined in stigmatizing the Jews. The way some Jewish people aligned with the Germans hoping to curry favor against the rage, bigotry and viciousness of their Nazi occupants.
What I was most angry about were the inarguable parallels between 1939 Poland and our country. Right freaking now.
It’s all there to see:
Demonizing people (Muslims, Mexicans, pretty much anyone of color) who are then targeted for roundup, all condoned by our highest “leaders,” and I use that word extremely loosely.
Cruelty and name-calling by these same “leaders.”
Blind fealty to those “leaders” by people seeking to curry favor or gain power or money, or, worse, who are simply sheep following a dark shepherd.
Rewriting of history to eliminate references to anything that takes away from the myth being perpetrated to tout everything the present “leader” is doing as acceptable.
Taking power from other branches of government with willful participants in what will be their own inevitable circumcision.
Controlling the media and the message by getting the “independent” media to play into a “he said-she said” game that gives credence to two sides when one is morally indefensible. Just read some of the major media coverage of Zohran Mamdani’s Democratic mayoral primary win in my native New York City; it’s as if the victory by a Muslim in the most melting pot city in the world was a catastrophe because he defeated a middle-aged, lifelong pol who’s White and that scares the big-money folks.
All of that is in The Pianist and all of that is going on today in the U.S. Right freaking now.
There is ample evidence if you widen your sources beyond Fox News or other extreme right-wing propaganda machines for the present administration.
A recent example of the propaganda machine was the president’s decision to send National Guard troops to California and the way it played out. The president claimed he spoke with California Gov. Gavin Newsom about it, but in fact, they’d spoken a day earlier and the president hadn’t said a word about the National Guard. Fox then accused Newsom of lying when he said the president had never told him he was sending in the Guard. The expression “state-run media,” most commonly used in dictatorships such as Russia, comes to mind.
Folks, our lives should not be treated like a reality show, especially when the current “host” has, for loss of attention span and lack of intellect, ceded power to a band of uniquely cruel racists and homophobes (Stephen Miller, Pete Hegseth), ignoramuses (RFK Jr., Tulsi Gabbard) and sycophants (J.D. Vance, Linda McMahon, Mike Johnson). The list of those lining up to kiss butt is remarkably long. And that’s an incredibly sad thing.
As a Jew myself, the son of a father who fought in World War II, I grew up recognizing that this country was founded on the backs of immigrants, a larger percentage of whom in past centuries than now did so by “illegally” sneaking in. Allowing people a chance to succeed, pay taxes and realize a better life? What could be more American?
Apparently, now it is. Because while few would argue with catching illegal immigrants who have committed violent crimes, what’s going on around the country now is not that. Rather, these roundups of non-violent immigrants, often here legally, by fully masked, badge-free ICE agents to meet quotas are representative of a banana republic. The vindictiveness being displayed, and the way some are jumping on the bandwagon, is exactly what The Pianist illustrated happened nearly 90 years ago.
The attacks against anyone perceived as “different,” the effort to pit middle and lower classes against each other based on an array of random prejudices (against Blacks, Muslims, LGBTQ, women), that’s what Nazi Germany was all about. And it’s here. Right freaking now.
One difference, and it’s the difference that offers hope, is that, as in The Pianist, there is opposition. And in 2025, we can already see opposition that is bigger and stronger—and it’s growing. It is through the constant voice of people, the willingness to use cell phone cameras, write blog posts, speak truth to power that we keep hope alive.
We are in a state of retrograde that began as far back as 1980 with a shift to reform tax codes to favor the wealthy, and that has accelerated under the current adminstration with its cult-like “leader.” I believe we can and will come out of this, a period that history will judge harshly. But we’ll do so only if people like you and me, those offended by movement away from societal and historical freedoms rightfully earned, continue to speak up.
What’s happening today in this country, our country, is not normal. It may not affect you directly, and I get that it can be easy to keep avoiding or ignoring in the face of keeping your sanity. At the start of The Pianist, Szpilman’s family had an opportunity to get out, to leave their beloved Warsaw. They chose, as a family, to stay, believing things wouldn’t go that far. They underestimated.
I’m not underestimating. If we don’t keep up our voices, the next step will be to somehow alter the election process, suspend elections, or supercede our constitution and allow this “leader” to seek a third term. Because that’s what authoritarians do (See Putin, Russia).
I may turn people off with such a direct message but to stay silent is to be complicit. Our nation, and the world, deserve better from us. Right freaking now.