Movie: The Lives of Others
Year: 2006
Director: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
Language: German
Synopsis:The drama is set in 1984 in East Germany. We are introduced to Wiesler who is an interrogator at the Stasi and is known to be really good in his work. In his personal life he is a loner and a favorite of Grubitz who is his friend and superior. Grubitz wants Wiesler to spy on playwright Georg Dreyman, who is suspected of pro-Western sympathies. Stasi agents secretly enter Dreyman's flat, install small microphones and then monitor activity from the attic space above. Wiesler believes in the cause of the government completely and hence has unparalleled loyalty to the cause. However very soon he finds that the real reason behind the surveillance is that a minister named Hempf desires Dreyman's girlfriend, actress Christa-Maria Sieland. Dreyman's arrest would rid Hempf of a rival. Wiesler, a true believer in the socialist regime, is disillusioned by a minister abusing his powers for personal interests. Christa- Maria on the other hand sees Hempf secretly as she is scared to turn down such a powerful person. Wiesler who secretly doesn’t like the way dissidents are treated and feels that they deserve some compassion secretly arranges a Dreyman and Maria confrontation to clear the air. As they confront one of Dreyman’s friend commits suicide. This finally spurs Dreyman into speaking out against the regime. He arranges to anonymously publish an article on carefully concealed suicide rates in the GDR in the West German magazine Der Spiegel. Because all typewriters are registered, Dreyman uses a typewriter smuggled in from the West with a red ribbon to write the article, which he hides under the threshold between two rooms of his apartment. Before discussing sensitive issues in the flat, Dreyman and his friends try to test whether the flat is bugged by a feigned attempt at smuggling. However, out of compassion, Wiesler fails to pass on the information, making the conspirators think that the flat is not bugged. Though Wiesler intended his inactivity to be a one-time move, his compassion for the couple grows and he continues to lie in his reports to protect Dreyman, and also reduces surveillance hours, so that he no longer has to share the work with an assistant, who will not try to protect them. The story progresses all the way till unification of the Germanies and finally ends in Dreyman learning from Hempf that he was under full surveillance probing into his Stasi file, he finds out that, while agent "HGW XX/7" had heard Dreyman's activity against the regime he had prevented Dreyman from being found out. At the final page, a smudge of red ink reveals the agent's contact with the hidden typewriter. Dreyman succeeds in locating Wiesler, and he watches for a few minutes from a distance as Wiesler goes about his new job delivering advertising leaflets. Two years later, Dreyman publishes a novel, “Sonata for a Good Man” dedicated "To HGW XX/7, with gratitude".
My own take: The movie won the Best Foreign Language Movie in 2007 Academy Awards and definitely deserves this. The beauty of the movie is the internal strife that Wiesler goes through when he starts this particular assignment. I had read a story long back about a Japanese interrogator who was a loner because he could look through people. And the story told about how his talent was his curse. Wiesler strongly reminds me of that character. The reason he feels so strongly for this couple suddenly even after doing so many successful assignments is because he realizes somewhere in between, that he is spying on two individuals who are not a threat as is made to believe. And his actions that follow which make him go through a series of terrible events but make him hold on to his values. Sometimes I get a feeling that maybe he is trying to atone for his guilt of the past or maybe his emotions let him to believe that if he can get it right just this one time maybe he will be forgive himself? The movie is a sensitive portrayal of the relationship between Dreyman and Maria and is beautiful in parts. Not a light watch and will leave you with some points to ponder. The last shot where both the characters acknowledge each other is very unique.
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