Outstanding

Rating: 10/10 (20 October 2007)

Artists are dangerous to dictatorships as this film so ably proves. A work of art, such as this film about life in the GDR, has the power to influence opinion in a way that history books cannot. In the interview with director Donnersmarck on the DVD extras he mentions that he spent a year and a half doing research for this. He read everything he could on the GDR and conducted extensive interviews with former GDR people, including ex-Stasi agents. Many of the actors are East Germans including Ulrich Mühe who was himself under surveillance by the Stasi. All of this reflects Donnersmark's stated desire for authenticity, down to using original surveillance equipment and filming some of the final scenes in the actual Stasi archives. In any case, if we were to abstract this story from any basis in reality and view it as fiction, it is still powerful. By concentrating on a few individuals it presents a chilling view of the effects of living in a repressive dictatorship. I found this movie to have a keener effect on me than Wells' "1984."
The movie poses the question of what a good man is to do when living in a fascist regime. Those who wield the power have the techniques down as to how to control the citizenry - threats to family, threats to job, brutal interrogation, and even torture. If someone knows enough about you, it is a trivial matter to exploit your vulnerabilities to keep you in line. How much would you compromise? How much would you risk in order to be true to yourself?
The most fascinating aspect of this film for me deals with the moral dilemmas faced by its two main protagonists - the theater director and writer Georg Dreyman and the Stasi agent Hauptmann Wiesler who sets up full surveillance on Dreyman. Both are torn between loyalties to their professions, their county, their friends, and ultimately each to his own conscience.
Mühe plays Wiesler with subtlety - he turns in an awesome performance primarily achieved through facial expression and body movement. His gradual transformation is wonderful to behold and there is enough ambiguity to keep you guessing as to the causes. Does his surveillance of Dreyman provoke jealousy, sympathy, sexual longings, shame, enlightenment, all of these, or what? And Dreyman's transformation is no less interesting, albeit more easily understood. If you like movies where events change people, you will like this.
The colors are a bit drab - grays, greens, and browns. But they reflect an implied drabness as to what life was like in the GDR. I wish there were more commentaries on IMDb from those who lived through this.
The musical score offers a perfect backdrop.
"The Lives of Others" is absorbing and virtually flawless.