Das Leben der Anderen (2006)

User Rating:

8.5/10   

Director:

Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck

Writer:

Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (written by)

Release Date:

23 March 2006 (Germany)

Genre:

Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

Before the Fall of the Berlin Wall, East Germany's Secret Police Listened to Your Secrets

Plot:

In 1984 East Berlin, an agent of the secret police, conducting surveillance on a writer and his lover, finds himself becoming increasingly absorbed by their lives.

Plot Keywords:

Actress | Party | Surveillance | 1984 | 1980s

Awards:

Won Oscar. Another 60 wins & 21 nominations

Cast

Martina Gedeck	...	Christa-Maria Sieland
Ulrich Mühe	...	Hauptmann Gerd Wiesler
Sebastian Koch	...	Georg Dreyman
Ulrich Tukur	...	Oberstleutnant Anton Grubitz
Thomas Thieme	...	Minister Bruno Hempf
Hans-Uwe Bauer	...	Paul Hauser
Volkmar Kleinert	...	Albert Jerska
Matthias Brenner	...	Karl Wallner
Charly Hübner	...	Udo
Herbert Knaup	...	Gregor Hessenstein
Bastian Trost	...	Häftling 227
Marie Gruber	...	Frau Meineke
Volker Michalowski	...	Schriftexperte (as Zack Volker Michalowski)
Werner Daehn	...	Einsatzleiter in Uniform
Martin Brambach	...	Einsatzleiter Meyer

Also Known As:

The Lives of Others (UK) (USA)
Das Leben der Anderen - Die Sonate vom guten Menschen (Germany) (working title)
De andras liv (Finland: Swedish title) (Sweden) [sv]
La vida de los otros (Argentina) (Spain) [es]
A Vida dos Outros (Brazil) [pt]
A mások élete (Hungary) [hu]
Baskalarinin hayati (Turkey: Turkish title) [tr]
Chaiyim shel acherim (Israel: Hebrew title) [iw]
De andres liv (Denmark) [da]
La vida dels altres (Spain: Catalan title) [ca]
La vie des autres (France) [fr]
Le vite degli altri (Italy) [it]
Muiden elämä (Finland) [fi]
Oi zoes ton allon (Greece) [el]
Teiste elu (Estonia) [et]
Zivoty tých druhých (Slovakia) [sk]
Zivoty tech druhých (Czech Republic) [cs]
Zycie na podsluchu (Poland) [pl]

MPAA:

Rated R for some sexuality/nudity.

Runtime:

137 min

Country:

Germany

Language:

German | French

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Germany:12 | Czech Republic:12 | USA:R | Argentina:13 | Finland:K-11 | Sweden:7 | UK:15 | Ireland:15A | Singapore:M18 | Hong Kong:IIB | France:Unrated | Australia:MA | Netherlands:12 | Portugal:M/16 | Canada:14A (Ontario) | Switzerland:10 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:10 (canton of Geneva) | Italy:T | South Korea:15 | Malaysia:U | Spain:7 | Brazil:12 | New Zealand:M | India:A | Norway:11

Filming Locations:

Altes Stadthaus, Klosterstraße, Berlin, Germany

Company:

Arte

Trivia:

The entire budget of the film, about 2 million dollars (1.6 million Euro), was possible only because the actors were willing to work for 20% of their customary salary.

Goofs:

Continuity: The font generated by Wiesler's typewriter is sans-serifed, whereas the font on the 'same' reports read by Dreyman towards the end of the movie is quite different, this time serifed.

Quotes:

Oberstleutnant Anton Grubitz: I have to show you something: "Prison Conditions for Subversive Artists: Based on Character Profile". Pretty scientific, eh? And look at this: "Dissertation Supervisor, A. Grubitz". That's great, isn't it? I only gave him a B. They shouldn't think getting a doctorate with me is easy...

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Shhh (2008)

best German dramatic movie in years

having had the joy - while not living in the old gdr itself - to have some "accidental" run ins with the good old stasi then, i found it awkward that a German director from the "west" would have the guts to take on the subject of this "ministry of greyness".

writer/director florian henkell von donnersmarck (nice name for a teutonic director, me thinks, very fancy - makes you bang your heels) not only survived this bout of pretension which could have let him drowned in a swamp of reproaches and allegations about executing the "justice of the winners", but he transformed the tale into a story that can and will be understood anywhere in the world: a tale about power, treason and the almost anarchistic potency of emotions.

while at the same time not falling into the trap of moralizing with a waving finger but showing us "the system" as an bureaucratic nightmare powered by - eventually - once even good intentioned human robots of socialist self-righteousness who actually destroy all real positive socialist impulses in the ones they plague, this film is - even if one disagrees with it's premises - probably the most important political drama coming out of Germany for years.