yes

I loved this movie -- one of the best films I've seen in a few years.

The turning point for me seemed to be the moment Wiesler goes into their bedroom and gazes at the bed (he even puts the bedcover to his face, I think), the site of their shared intimacy -- and it's all brought home that he lacks that profound human connection with anyone else. But of course he craves it -- witness the scene with the prostitute where he tries to get her to stay for just a few minutes more after sex, just for her company. So in that moment, his long-standing impulse (not to mention his political/bureaucratic
mission) to destroy intimacy begins to be undermined by his impulse to protect it.

oy! danf. Thanks. I had missed that thread (was out of town).

scody, I know what you mean. I thought too that the turning point was linked to the violation of the couple's relationship. But maybe I give a little more weight on the scenes before Wiesler's visit to the couple's house, and in particular on the scene where the couple is in bed together, after Christa has returned from the rape-ride. Georg hugs her despite what he knows. She does not pretend, despite that she does not know he knows.

Nevertheless, that in my mind is also just the culminating point. Wiesler has already witnessed the mediocrity and vulgarity of the regime even before (his stupid schoolmate is now his boss, the building where he lives -usually quarters of the government employees-- is served by the same prostitute) and he must in a sense juxtapose himself to Dreyman -he is a pittance while the writer is pure.

I am impressed by what goatdog said in the earlier thread (I love such disagreements). I, in fact, felt exactly the opposite. The reason I hadn't been to see it, well till last night, was exactly that I am fed up with the preaching, manipulative, old eastern-block movies -the type "look what we went through, but now we are over it". But this was not one such flick. All the "good" and the "bad" types in the movie were communists. All had the same ideals (well theoretically at least). Hauser and Dreyman and Jerska (above all) were still socialists --reading Brecht for fuck's sake, like it is the bible that will save their soul! That brought tears in my eyes but it wasn't an emotional blackmail, it was a sort of poignant realization, that this all did go on and no-fucking-one got punished. Just like real life. The "happy ending" that usually restores faith to "social justice" did not happen. The minister remains (although I did not get what his capacity was at the end) and so does Wiesler (and all the Wieslers really). And the closing scene "Karl Marx Buchenwald" shows that even marxism endures. Make of that what you want, but still.

And one last thing, the movie was full of small, snippets of dialogue and/or visual effects that conveyed so much meaning as prolly half the rest of the movie.

oh, hell. I hadn't been to the movies in ages and boom, I get that. There is a sexual analogue I could give here, but ... okay, no, I am embarassed.