Sunday, May 27, 2007

The Lives of Others

Tonight we saw The Lives of Others - a German film set in East Germany - before the fall of the Wall.

A secret policeman is assigned to get some dirt on a prominent writer. So he bugs the man's apartment and starts listening. The plot complicates quickly, in surprising but plausible ways, particularly because the policeman starts to feel sympathy for the people he is spying on.

East Germany - which had gone from life under the Nazis to life under the Communists - was particularly known for the thoroughness of their secret police - the Stasi.

It's hard to control
The human soul,
But they spied
And tried.

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