Who is Roman Polanski?
If you’re European, you would identify him as the Polish-born writer and director who survived the Holocaust and went on to create such classic films as Repulsion, Knife in the Water, Rosemary’s Baby, Chinatown, and The Pianist. But if you’re American, you know him first and foremost as the pervert who fled the country to avoid going to jail for raping a 13-year-old girl, and who still can’t re-enter the country — not even to accept an Academy Award — without being immediately arrested. But watch Marina Zenovich’s fascinating documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, and you’ll realize that the American impression of Polanski’s notorious 1978 skirmish with the U.S. legal system is almost completely incorrect. Okay, he did win the Oscar for The Pianist, but the rest of it? Considerably less than accurate. “Polanski is not a pedophile,” Zenovich says over the phone from Los Angeles. “The D.A.’s office looked for other examples of this kind of behaviour and they couldn’t find anythi
