Film through law. Law through film.
Law on Film podcast explores the rich connections between law and film. While law is critical to many films, films also show how the law is perceived and portrayed. Each episode looks at a different film. What does the film get right about the law? What does is get wrong? And what does the film tell us about the larger social and cultural context in which law operates?
Latest Episode
The Lives of Others
Guests: Mark Drumbl & Barbora Hola
The Lives of Others is director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s haunting exploration of surveillance, complicity, and the brittle architecture of authoritarian legality in the final years of the German Democratic Republic (GDR/East Germany). The critically acclaimed 2006 film examines how law can be co-opted into an instrument of domination, how bureaucratic routines of “security” normalize repression, and how small acts of resistance acquire profound moral weight under systems built on fear and an extensive system of informers. The Lives of Others raises enduring questions about the ethics of observing and informing in Cold War Eastern Europe. To help unpack these themes, I’m joined by Mark Drumbl and Barbara Holá, whose recent book Informers Up Close: Stories from Communist Prague (Oxford Univ. Press) offers a deeply researched, empirically grounded look at informers within repressive regimes and transitional justice processes.
