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.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.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.
- Won 1 Oscar
- 80 wins & 38 nominations total
Volker Zack
- Schriftexperte
- (as Zack Volker Michalowski)
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaAll the listening/recording props in the film are actual Stasi equipment on loan from museums and collectors. The props master had spent two years in a Stasi prison, and insisted upon absolute authenticity, down to the machine used to steam-open up to 600 letters per hour.
- GoofsSecretary Hempf's car is a 1980s stretch version of a Volvo 264. But all the interior scenes are shot using a Mercedes Benz S-Class Pullmann from the time of the film production. In a short clip the Mercedes is also used for an exterior shot, when Grubitz enters the car outside the ministry building.
- Quotes
[last lines]
Buchverkäufer: 29.80. Would you like it gift wrapped?
Hauptmann Gerd Wiesler: No. It's for me.
- Alternate versionsThe US version features a written prologue in English, explaining the historical context of the film.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Siskel & Ebert: The Best Films of 2006 (2006)
- SoundtracksIch Wurde Wenn Ich Wusste, Dass Ich Konnte
Performed by 4PS
Lyrics By Kurt Demmler
Music By Joachim-Franz Bartzsch
Published By Edition Air Franz
(P) 2007 Colosseum Music Entertainment GmbH, Licensed From Sony BMG Music Entertainment (Germany) GmbH
Featured review
Every positive word written about this movie is absolutely true
I am still quite speechless. Overwhelmed by how utterly compelling the story was and by how emotive the acting story was. Floored by the unbelievably great character development. This film is close to perfect. It is a spiritual cousin to 2004's magnificent Downfall and shares a lot of similarities with Paul Verhoeven's stunning Black Book from last year, not just because these films share two actors. This multi-faceted character driven masterpiece really is as good as it's hype says.
Sebastian Koch in particular absolutely shines. He is one of the best international actors working today and he follows the brilliance of his role in Black Book with the lead here. With his bohemian, dishevelled good looks and brilliant charisma, he's the best German-speaking actor since Bruno Ganz. But he is far from the only good actor in this movie, Ulrich Mühe as the State Security (Stasi) agent whose task it is to monitor Koch's suspiciously free thinking playwright, brings another near perfect performance to the movie. Agent Wiesler initially appears to the audience as the polar opposite of Koch's character. With his grey button down clothing, closely cropped hair and consistently emotionless face he symbolises everything about the overbearing untrusting Socialist government of East Germany that is wrong. He could easily have remained that character throughout the whole film but he becomes the surprising emotional centre of the story and the line between heroes and villains is significantly shifted (something which extends to the supporting cast as well. Truth be told there are probably only two characters in this film whom I didn't have to rethink my opinion of). Weisler reveals himself as a lonely, isolated man who risks his entire career as his attitude to his subject changes from one of mistrust to one of near-adoration. There is an undeniable link between the two characters even though they never share a single scene and Georg Dreyman (Koch) doesn't even find about Wiesler until the last 10 minutes of the movie, which leads us up to what should go down as one of the greatest endings in cinema history. Just thinking about the final spoken lines brings the tears to my eyes.
As I said, without a doubt one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. And as much as I adore Pan's Labyrinth, this one really did deserve it's Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year. An absolute masterpiece.
Sebastian Koch in particular absolutely shines. He is one of the best international actors working today and he follows the brilliance of his role in Black Book with the lead here. With his bohemian, dishevelled good looks and brilliant charisma, he's the best German-speaking actor since Bruno Ganz. But he is far from the only good actor in this movie, Ulrich Mühe as the State Security (Stasi) agent whose task it is to monitor Koch's suspiciously free thinking playwright, brings another near perfect performance to the movie. Agent Wiesler initially appears to the audience as the polar opposite of Koch's character. With his grey button down clothing, closely cropped hair and consistently emotionless face he symbolises everything about the overbearing untrusting Socialist government of East Germany that is wrong. He could easily have remained that character throughout the whole film but he becomes the surprising emotional centre of the story and the line between heroes and villains is significantly shifted (something which extends to the supporting cast as well. Truth be told there are probably only two characters in this film whom I didn't have to rethink my opinion of). Weisler reveals himself as a lonely, isolated man who risks his entire career as his attitude to his subject changes from one of mistrust to one of near-adoration. There is an undeniable link between the two characters even though they never share a single scene and Georg Dreyman (Koch) doesn't even find about Wiesler until the last 10 minutes of the movie, which leads us up to what should go down as one of the greatest endings in cinema history. Just thinking about the final spoken lines brings the tears to my eyes.
As I said, without a doubt one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. And as much as I adore Pan's Labyrinth, this one really did deserve it's Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year. An absolute masterpiece.
helpful•738
- Cloudmeister
- Apr 17, 2007
Details
- Release date
- Countries of origin
- Official site
- Language
- Also known as
- Khoảnh Khắc Cuộc Đời
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $2,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $11,286,112
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $223,000
- Feb 11, 2007
- Gross worldwide
- $77,357,476
- Runtime2 hours 17 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 2.39 : 1
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![Martina Gedeck, Sebastian Koch, and Ulrich Mühe in The Lives of Others (2006)](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNmQyNmJjM2ItNTQzYi00ZjMxLWFjMDYtZjUyN2YwZDk5YWQ2XkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMjUzOTY1NTc@._V1_QL75_UX90_CR0,0,90,133_.jpg)