'Pianist' is indeed a remarkable film

The occasions when I've agreed with Academy Award voters on their top choices have been few and far between over the past decade, but it's hard to disagree with this year's best-actor and best-director winners. "The Pianist" is a truly remarkable film.

-- "The Pianist" (Universal, 2002; R for violence, language; $26.98). This film is indeed last year's finest hour, a gripping, thoroughly involving true story of the human spirit and the struggle to survive against all odds.

Wladyslaw Szpilman (played magnificently by Adrien Brody) was an acclaimed pianist and composer in Poland when World War II broke out. The film follows him as his family is forced into the ghetto, then into concentration camps, until, eventually, Szpilman is stripped of everything he holds dear -- including his family. Eventually, he finds himself alone, struggling to live through the horror of Nazi oppression.

It's an amazing story told in an unflinching but never exploitative manner by screenwriter Ronald Harwood and director Roman Polanski. Regardless of your feelings about Polanski on a personal level, he remains a formidable filmmaker, and this may be his best work. (Polanski, Harwood and Brody all won Oscars.)

The documentary included here, "A Story of Survival," is not as much about Polanski's own childhood experiences during the Holocaust as has been advertised. There is some of that, but it's really just a traditional making-of featurette (40 minutes in length). And there should have been more about the real-life Szpilman.

Extras: Separate widescreen and full-frame editions, making-of documentary, trailers, text production notes, etc.

-- "The Mission" (Warner, 1986, PG, $26.99, 2 discs). In the mid- 18th century, a mercenary (Robert De Niro) reforms and becomes a Jesuit priest. He helps his mentor (Jeremy Irons) bring religion to a group of Indians in the mountains of Brazil, a tribe cut off from the world by a steep waterfall. But eventually, politics and business come together and threaten to destroy all they have done.

Despite the excellent performances, led by De Niro and Irons, the real star here is the film's atmosphere, provided by gorgeous cinematography (by Chris Menges, who won an Oscar), an entrancing music score (by Ennio Morricone) and an eye for detail by the film's director (Roland Joffe).

This film has been on DVD previously, but this is a gussied-up special edition, with an interesting audio commentary by Joffe and, on the second disc, a fine vintage hourlong TV documentary: "Omnibus: the Making of 'the Mission.' "

There's actually no reason for two discs; one could have held all the material. But the gorgeous, remastered transfer and upgraded stereo will make this irresistible to fans of the film.

Extras: Widescreen, audio commentary, making-of documentary, etc.

-- "The Recruit" (Touchstone, 2003, PG-13, $29.99). Colin Farrell, who seems to be in every other movie these days, is the title character, recruited by Al Pacino for the CIA. The first two-thirds of the movie -- as Farrell is brought in, undergoes a battery of tests and finds himself attracted to a fellow recruit who may or may not be a mole -- makes this thriller quite entertaining. Sadly, it falls apart at the end, and you won't want to think about the twists and turns too much.

Still, most of the way, it's quite good. And the extras include an interesting documentary about the real CIA recruiting process.

Extras: Widescreen, audio commentary, deleted scenes, making-of documentary, etc.

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