The Lives Of Others (2007) (German, English subs)


Martina Gedeck          Christa-Maria Sieland
Ulrich Muehe            Capt Gerd Wiesler
Sebastian Koch          Georg Dreyman
Ulrich Tukur            Lt-Col Anton Grubitz
Thomas Thieme           Minister Bruno Hempf
Hans-Uwe Bauer          Paul Hauser
Herbert Knaup           Gregor Hessenstein
Volkmar Kleinert        Albert Jerski
Matthias Brenner        Karl Wallner
Charly Huebner          Udo

Directed by:            Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
Produced by:            Quirin Berg, Max Wiedemann, Dirk Hamm


East Berlin, November 1984. Five years before its downfall, the former East-German government ensured its claim 
to power with a ruthless system of control and surveillance. Party-loyalist Captain Gerd Wiesler hopes to boost 
his career when given the job of collecting evidence against the playwright Georg Dreyman and his girlfriend, the 
celebrated theater actress Christa-Maria Sieland. After all, the "operation" is backed by the highest political 
circles. What he didn't anticipate, however, was that submerging oneself into the world of the target also changes 
the surveillance agent. The immersion in the lives of others--in love, literature, free thinking and speech--makes 
Wiesler acutely aware of the meagerness of his own existence and opens to him a completely new way of life which 
he has ever more trouble resisting. But the system, once started, cannot be stopped. A dangerous game has begun.

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The horrifying, sometimes unintentionally funny system of observation in the former East Germany. In the early 
1980s, the successful dramatist Georg Dreyman and his longtime companion Christa-Maria Sieland, a popular actress, 
are big intellectual stars in the socialist state, although they secretly don't always think loyal to the party 
line. One day, the Minister of Culture becomes interested in Christa, so the secret service agent Wiesler is 
instructed to observe and sound out the couple, but their life fascinates him more and more.