The Pianist

As I watched Adrien Brody in The Pianist, meeting the russians in a german overcoat I could not help but recall the lines of Bukowski:

Working Out

Van Gogh cut off his ear
gave it to a
prostitute
who flung it away in
extreme
disgust.

Van, whores don't want
ears
they want
money.

I guess that's why you were
such a great
painter: you
didn't understand
much
else.

The character of Adrien Brody was barely in touch with reality throughout World War II. I envied him when he played again on a piano at the end. After living through what he did, it must have been an extreme pleasure to even touch the keys of the piano.
This cannot happen today, can it? There is something with our time - the greatest peril we face is the lack of pocket money. It's still as hard if not harder to stand out from the crowd, but it's much easier than it ever was to drift with the current. Without the fight for survival we're in a big identity crisis. The world is getting smaller every day in a variety of ways and it only deepens the crisis.
How to answer that need?