His name was Wladyslaw Szpilman. He was a Jewish pianist from Poland who somehow endured the brutal slaughter of the Holocaust. In learning of his story, just one in millions, I am silenced and humbled by his reality. Can it be true? Did a human being actually live through such vile shit? Despite insurmountable loss and the degradation of his dignity, it seems to have been pure luck that spared him from the never-ending onslaught of peril which befell the Jews of World War II. His story, as told in the film The Pianist and acted by Adrien Brody is a window of pain, a glimpse into the hell that was that time. Stories are so important, for without them, so much would be lost and film is such a vivid and expressive storytelling medium. Truly, the world as an entity and the endless procession of LIFE is indifferent to such stories. Life goes on, as it does, through the systematic death of genocide, through pain, through human emotion, through war and peace. It is only the human heart that declares and decries the importance of the story. The story of a life. One life. As insignificant as a blade of grass in a sea of wheat, yet so painfully beautiful that it demands its own relevance. Swollen with moments and bursting with memories. Full and rich with the colors of a being; their smile, their fears, laughter, passions, secret wishes and regrets. Each story is like a satin thread of it’s own unique hue, woven around and about, through and across family, friendship, romance, enemies, communities, people.
So much has been lost. So many bright flames snuffed out and stories untold. Immense talent, innovations, genius and gifts, bestowed upon our species by God, squandered and desecrated. Forgotten, if not but for their story. And if not but for their story, we run the risk of repeat. To ponder the dark elements of the past is a heavy pursuit, filled with great sadness. Stories unimaginable, unfathomable, as is that of Wladyslaw Szpilman, the Jewish pianist from Poland.
I would love to believe that such defective and atrocious human behavior has been retired, factored out culturally and genetically from our ubiquitous presence on the planet. Sadly, such is not the case. Human beings continue to suffer at the hands of eachother, whether actual genocide or genocide of the spirit. Today while listening to the radio, I heard an Indian woman speak of the abuse she suffers as a member of the lowest hierarchical Hindu class. People will not touch her. They spit in her face. Merchants throw what she buys on the ground and will not allow her to touch their wares, for fear that she will contaminate with her filth. She is forced to walk in the gutter, where she is presumed to belong. Her children are brutalized as outcasts. In Pakistan, a woman was sentenced to death for speaking of a spiritual path beyond Islam. For simply mentioning Christianity. For thinking. For expressing an individual and deviant thought.
What can be done? I don’t know. But I am aware of a certain perturbation in my mind as I expose myself to the stories of people. As I allow, through the medium of film, my eyes to witness their suffering and my heart to open in celebration of their life. As frames of their existence pass before my eyes I am filled with something that I believe moves mountains: Inspiration. When we are inspired, we are conscious. We are awake. We see. When our consciousness expands to new realms, we choose wisely and opt for the elimination of suffering on the planet. The Pianist is but one story of a life that flickered on in a long hall of great darkness. I recommend the film. I recommend exposing yourself to as many such stories as you possibly can, making you a person of the world. A person of compassion and celebration of the dignity of the human spirit. Below you will find a list of biographical films and non-fictional stories that I have found to be hugely inspiring. They open my mind and creep across my heart like vines, making me vigilant in the protection of LIFE and reverential towards our precious humanity.
Based on the true stories of people’s lives:
Milk, Frida, The Pianist, Schindler’s List, The Miracle Worker, Escape from Sobibor, Coal Miner’s Daughter, All the President’s Men, Norma Rae, Gandhi, Glory, Apollo 13, Braveheart, Dangerous Minds, Selena, Elizabeth, Saving Private Ryan, Boys Don’t Cry, Girl Interrupted, Erin Brokovish, Gorillas in the Mist, Remember the Titans, Seabiscuit, Wild Hearts Can’t be Broken, Hotel Rwanda, Miracle, Finding Neverland, The Motorcycle Diaries, Walk the Line, The Pursuit of Happiness, Freedom Writers, Tupac Resurrection, Into the Wild, Changeling, The Express, The Other Boleyn Girl, The Blind Side, Julie and Julia, The Social Network, I am Cuba.
