Polanski on Sharon Tate, Manson, Nazis and life in and the Krakow Ghetto

[76elfin]

does anyone know what the name of the holicaust movie he made.would like to watch it thank you

[terratrema]

@76elfin

The Pianist.

It's horribly brilliant.

[76elfin]

@terratrema thank you

[spike1138]

@76elfin That would be The Pianist. He won the Academy Award for it in 2003 and inserted many of his own experiences from the Krakow ghetto into the film, including the scene where the main character is able to escape deportation to Auschwitz with all the other people being bundled onto trains with the help of a friendly Polish police guard.

I've posted up some interview segments from the Making Of where Roman talks more about the film and his own holocaust experiences whilst making the film.

[76elfin]

@spike1138 thank you I will be sure to watch the stuff you posted sounds interresting too.

[zasek89]

@76elfin The Pianist , I think that you're think about this one

[terratrema]

I remember watching this when it was on TV 10 years ago or whatever.

Towards the end, Mark Cousins brings up the Samantha Geimer rape incident and Polanksi starts yelling at him. It gets all very loud, confused, uncomfortable and scary.

But then Cousins says "Thank you very much for coming, Roman Polanski", and Polanski smiles happily and they shake on it and walk off together chatting as the credits begin to role.

Interesting and kinda funny.

[spike1138]

@terratrema That's not *quite* what happens - I posted that section too in another video on my channel here called Life After Hollywood.

Cousins doesn't address the incident directly as such, he asks Roman to give his thoughts on the critical view of his next movie Tess (1979) when it came out that features a rape as a motivating aspect of the plot and the suggestion made at the time that Roman was in some sense "apologising" via the film for his previous actions and Roman gets very evasive.

[terratrema]

@spike1138

Ah, well, it was 10 years ago that I saw it, after all.

Thanks for posting these things anyways.

[76elfin]

@spike1138 sharon wrote tess didnt she? and he said this movie was in honor of sharon?

[spike1138]

@76elfin She didn't write it, no, be she did give Roman the book to read before she died and he absolutely "fell in love with it", as Hollywood types always say about books... I think actually she may have given it to him to read when he left to go to London and work on Day of the Dolphin, which was what he was doing and why he wasn't with her at home when she was murdered in their home. He did dedicate the film to her when he made it and it starts with a caption saying "For Sharon..."

[76elfin]

@spike1138 thanks for the info

[spike1138]

@terratrema The essential problem is that, like most holocaust survivors and people of his age and generation, Roman generally doesn't talk about the bad things that have happened in his life directly and doesn't address them or dwell on them. That generation don't do "therapy" as such, and when asked if he has ever sought help or been to see a shrink, his view is that "I don't need it". He doesn't talk about his experiences, he puts them into his work and that's his way of coping.

[spike1138]

@terratrema Now, facing up to the problems and tragedies by channeling them into his work is a valid choice in one sense, as is his conscious rejection of those traumas in the immediate aftermath. When Sharon was murdered, he gave all their possessions from the house away and moved abroad straight away rather than stay and try to deal with it. He made Macbeth to work through his grief and feelings about death, rather than look back or address them directly.

[spike1138]

@terratrema The problem comes that once you have come to terms with death and issues of your own mortality, the response is to throw yourself feet first into enjoying life with no regard for tommorrow, which Roman then proceeded to do in the form of sex, drugs and rock&roll. That's a fairly common survivor response. The problem is that it's also inherently selfish and pays little heed to the consequence your libertine hedonism will have on others. Which is why March 1977 happened.

[spike1138]

@terratrema I can understand why the allegations around Tess were made and I can understand Cousins' interest in repeating them and getting Roman's reaction to them. I can also understand why he feels frustrated when people place rigid interpretations on his work and use it to draw definitive conclusions about him and his thought processes when he's really channeling his feelings into the films rather than his intentions, trying to express something rather than say something.

[76elfin]

@spike1138 the wierdest thing about this is I saw an interview with the girl as an adult . she says she has forgiven roman and that shes come to terms with it and that she wishes everyone would just shut up about it!lol

[spike1138]

@76elfin That's hardly surprising - rape is a crime of victimisation and she's never considered herself to be a victim. Every time the case comes up in the news, reporters swarm around her house and ask her how she feels as his victim. Even at the time, she acknowledged that he didn't mean her any harm and she wasn't hurt by it and they were both high at the time, which was why it happened. She didn't want him to be punished other than just by admitting in court that it happened and was wrong.

[76elfin]

@spike1138 thanks for both replys very interresting.

[JeanMelkovsky]

@JeanMelkovsky or a short video version, that can't, of course, fully analyse all the aspects, but at least gives an idea of what actually happened: youtube.com/watch?v=BETVNdbISt­o&lc=kbaQgO6XfqCQwIlXyRUgho8sl­aFNTWytQUfxQ8JK5w8&context=C3e­df9ebADOEgsToPDskK-3GbirzRF_0x­blJpSyQAC

[spike1138]

@76elfin He admitted what he did in court and plead guilty to it, so in that sense, from her point of view, justice was served - no one could say that she was a golddigger or that she made it up, which many were.

She did successfully sue him in the 90s, but that was for damages in regard to the continued disruption to her life caused by his flight to France, not for the original crime; if he hadn't run, she wouldn't now have reporters on her lawn every time a new movie of his comes out.

[spike1138]

@terratrema In the end, the films to him are his version of therapy. And in therapy, therapists are not encouraged to make value judgements or impose their own interpretation or opinions or onto beliefs onto the patient.I can understand why he feels as if that strand of criticism is in some sense second guessing him and doing a disservice to the film by using to draw conclusions about him rather than evaluating the film on it's own merits. The film may be his, but he is not the film.

[GeorgeVreelandHill]

Amazing interview.

Thank you for posting it.

George Vreeland Hill