... (German: Das Leben der Anderen) is probably one of the best films I have seen for a long long time ... Watching the lives of those around you, with the ability to affect their densities ~ Will one try to do good? Will one seize the possibility, without guarantee of success? Will love for mankind triumph over national pride? Can one do the right thing, even if one has gone down the wrong path for so long?
There has been a lot of arguments about "The Lives of Others" as some critics felt that it is not reflective of what happened in Eastern Germany with the Stasi force. There has been no documented case of Stasi operative trying to save their subjects. Yet, this is where the beauty of the film lies ... It allows one to believe in the goodness of humankind, even in the darkest of place ...
"Remembering Maria A" by Brecht was read during the film and summarises the possibility of holding onto something good:
"It was a day in that blue month September
Silent beneath the plum trees' slender shade
I held her there
My love, so pale and silent
As if she were a dream that must not fade
Above us in the shining summer heaven
There was a cloud my eyes dwelled long upon
It was quite white and very high above us
Then I looked up
And found that it had gone
And since that day, so many moons in silence
Have swum across the sky and gone below
The plum trees surely have been chopped for firewood
And if you ask, how does that love seem now
I must admit, I really can't remember
And yet I know what you are trying to say
But what her face was like, I know no longer
I only know I kissed it on that day
As for the kiss, I long ago forgot it
But for the cloud that floated in the sky
I know that still and shall forever know it
It was quite white and moved in very high
It may be that the plum trees still are blooming
That woman's seventh child may now be there
And yet that cloud had only bloomed for minutes
When I looked up
It vanished on the air"
