The Hungarian novelist, Imre Kertész, once remarked, “It’s easier to write literature in a dictatorship than in a democracy.” On a first read, his comment could come across as too sweeping, even shocking. Yet it contains an acrimonious truth that pricks upon our social conscience, contesting the construct of ideological conformity: the more repressive a political reality becomes, the stronger a will that streams from creative consciousness to resist, survive, and live.

A drama of sublime suspense, The Lives of Others recounts the specific details of a Stasi^[1] officer’s mission in East Berlin during the mid-1980s. Captain Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Mühe) is charged by Minister Bruno Hempf (Thomas Thieme) with the responsibility for uncovering incriminating materials about the playwright, Georg Dreyman (Sebastian Koch) — the sole “non-subversive writer” — and begins to spy on him and his girlfriend, Christa-Maria Sieland (Martina Gedeck). A revered stage actress, Sieland, however, doubts her artistry. She becomes psychologically destabilized, unable to cope with her increasing dosage of a banned tranquilizer and with the sexual coercions of the Minister.

Captain Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Mühe)
IN Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others)
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.

Wiesler listens to all aspects of their daily lives, using surveillance equipment installed in the attic of their apartment building. While doing so, he discovers an unmasked version of himself. As a Stasi officer, he has regarded people as machines in which fear instrumentalizes and compartmentalizes emotions and personalities. His gradual transformation from a calculating and ruthless man to a sympathetic character — lost, yet willing to sacrifice himself to save Sieland and Dreyman — is a layered performance. In portraying his character, Mühe exposes reservoirs of feeling with a minimalism that is well-suited to the film’s tempo: crescendo misterioso.