Fresh
The Lives of Others is a powerful but quiet film, constructed of hidden thoughts and secret desires.
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
Overview
A chamber play taking place around Christmas, where Liv, her brother and mother are to celebrate Christmas together. The father has recently left the family and 14 year-old Liv cannot accept that Christmas is not what is used to be. Liv does her best in order to keep both family and Christmas together, but when her mother invites a young colleague to celebrate Christmas with them a painful struggle for power between Liv and her mother takes place.
Director and cast
Critics on Rotten Tomatoes
Top critics, in their words
Fresh
Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's film is a melodrama in a minor key, quietly affecting, quietly chilling, quietly quiet. It captures the drab architecture of totalitarianism, the soul-dead buildings of a soul-dead state.
Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel
Fresh
Its suspense builds on the fragile and nuanced business of emotional rebirth.
Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle
Fresh
A political thriller that's consistently as inventive as it is creepy.
Tom Long, Detroit News
Fresh
Few would deny that The Lives of Others is true to its self, and in its depiction of human nature -- and human spirit.
Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press
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