The Lives of Others 2006
I don’t remember hearing about this movie, but for some reason I looked it up after seeing it in someone’s collection who had given me a Screen Pass. It got very good reviews and won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. The movie takes place in East Germany in 1984 and concerns surveillance of a playwright by the state police, the Stasi. It is a very good movie. It is comparable in some ways to something by John Le Carre in that it focuses more on people than on action. I don’t want to give anything away about the movie, except that it is all in German and therefore has subtitles. It can be hard to gauge acting performances when you don’t understand the language, but these are very good characters and the acting seems first rate. After watching I read up on the movie and was amazed that one of the lead actors had something similar happen to him during his life in East Germany.
Written: 01 Oct 2021
Owned on: Digital