framing device

It’s amazing to think that it was over 17 years ago that the Berlin Wall fell. For anyone in high school, the Cold War is just a part of history books and old movies (or new movies about old history). I guess it’s even old history in Germany if the new movie The Lives of Others is any indication. How else to explain the superficial treatment of secret police surveillance and interrogations that the movie trots out, unless people have largely forgotten what it was really like?

The Lives of Others is set in East Berlin in 1984. The Erich Honecker government is at the height of its power, and its foundation is the Stasi, the East German secret police. Widely regarded as one of the most efficient security services ever, it’s estimated that the Stasi had 91,000 employees and an additional 300,000 informants out of a total population of just 15 million.

The movie’s main character is Captain Wiesler, a hard-nosed Stasi agent who teaches interrogation techniques to new recruits. He also can sniff out a subversive at 100 yards, as we see in one of the movie’s early scenes. So when a government minister asks him to start bugging a prominent writer, Wiesler is enthusiastic. He even starts handling some of the surveillance himself, eavesdropping on the writer and his actress girlfriend as they entertain guests, talk about politics and engage in tender lovemaking in the bedroom.

If you’ve already guessed that Wiesler, moved by the joys and sorrows of real people, will have a crisis of conscience and be forced to choose between what he’s always believed and this new-found reality, then you’ve seen too many movies (as have I). The film even sets us up with an early conversation at a party where the government minister and the writer argue over whether people can change. The evil minister, of course, pooh-poohs the idea, asserting confidently that people are stuck in their sins. If you detect a note of cynicism in my words, you’re right. It’s not that I believe people can’t change, but this middle-brow film makes it sound like all you need is just to meet the right people. The movie even posits with a straight face that anyone who truly loves music can’t be bad. Excuse me if I’m reminded of the great Simpsons quote about Sideshow Bob, “No one who speaks German can be an evil man.”

It doesn’t help that the film’s visual style is banal with a dull color palette and repetitive two-shot editing. As I told my friend Garth, it’s an old-fashioned political drama with the old-fashioned cliches. The music kicks in on cue whenever there’s even a hint of drama. The camera lingers over every detail, not because it’s beautifully photographed (it’s not) but so that the dim-witted audience doesn’t miss what’s going on. To the movie’s credit, though, the story moves along and I never got bored. Writer and director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck may not have any sort of directorial flair, but he at least knows how to keep the audience’s attention.

In that, he’s helped enormously by the strong cast. Martina Gedeck, who plays the girlfriend, is one of Germany’s finest actors, and she carries off each cliche (again, it’s no surprise that she’ll eventually have to sleep with the government minister) with strength and poise. Even better, though, is Ulrich Muhe, as Captain Wiesler. His carefully controlled facial expressions convey Wiesler’s transformation with convincing grace. In fact, I was swept up in his character and didn’t realize until much later how ludicrous it was.

It goes without saying that the audience at the Toronto Film Festival loved it. Loved it. Ate it up. But then who wouldn’t be moved at the sight of a Stasi officer renouncing everything he’s lived for, just because he’s moved by the words of Brecht and the melody of Beethoven? Now if we can only get those Guantanamo guards to listen to some Elvis.

The Lives of Others: three stars, out of five