Jannet Reyes - Zamora AP. World History Final per.6 June 4th, 2013 Music in History Throughout the years, Hollywood has interpreted many different historical events. Most of these events have involved music expansion throughout different generations. Some movies that show most of these characteristics, are, The Pianist, The diary of Anne Frank and The Red Violin. However, music itself has had a great evolution throughout the world that has supported us through our hardest and most difficult times. Hollywood films have shown us different historical events, but are all the history they illustrate true? A historical movie that has shown some rare facts is, The Pianist. In the movie, The Pianist we are shown a variety of kindness and thoughtful ways in which some Jews were treated through the Holocaust, but in reality, they weren't treated very kind. They were actually treated in a very brutal way, only some were treated in a nice way but it all depended on the Nazi soldier. An example given in this movie is when the pianist is hiding in a town where everything is ruined, he finds himself in an attic with a Nazi soldier. In this case, instead of the Jew being killed by the soldier, he is actually being taken care of by secret. He was fed and even given a coat that belong to the Nazi soldier. This illustrated a very rare event, because if a Nazi soldier were to have a Jew in hiding, they would have been killed and his family would as well have been in danger. Not just that but all of the Nazi soldiers, were supposed to be men who decided on their own, that they disliked Jews and that their existence should vanish forever, but in this case, the Nazi soldier felt mercy towards the Jew. This was, because when the Nazi soldier found the Jewish Pianist, he asked him what he had been before the war, and the Jewish man replied that he was a Pianist. Knowing this, the Nazi soldier asked him to play something, and as he saw the pianist enjoying to play again and actually enjoying something for a moment, he decided to let him live. Something very untruthful was that in the movie, Hollywood illustrated that it was very easy for the Jews to escape from the Nazi soldiers. This was because, when the pianist decided to escape, he just took his Jew stamp of his arm and blended in with the non-Jews. In reality, all of this is wrong because if you look at evidence or documents on the holocaust, mostly all of them say that it was very difficult for the Jews to escape, since the Nazi soldiers were always watching them. Not just that, but if a Nazi soldier would let a Jew escape, they would most likely find him because of all the military that existed against the Jews. Also, many people who were non-Jew knew who the Jews were so if they were to be mean people, they would have probably called the military themselves. On the other hand, Hollywood has also shown some true history in its movies. For example, in the movie the Diary of Anne Frank, we are told a true story written by a Jewish girl who didn’t survive the Holocaust, but wrote everything from the beginning until she was taken into a concentration camp. Something that surprised me the most was that in the movie, it said that when it was day light, her family would turn on the radio in a very quiet volume to at least feel as if they were alive. This just shows that music would in a way make them feel a bit better because they felt alive. Also since this movie as well as The Pianist is based on a true story, not much can change but some details could have been different. In addition, the movie The Pianist portrays the truth of history within the main character known as a Jewish Pianist. This is because he wrote this story and he lived through it, so he himself only knew what it meant to live through the Holocaust. As he told his story, he sowed how music for him was a way in which he felt alive and in a way remembered what life was like when he
