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YMMV / Good Bye, Lenin!

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  • Alternative Character Interpretation:
    • To what extent was Alex's charade done out of love and overzealous concern for his mother, versus nostalgia for the past and his suddenly-lost country?
    • Was Ariane, Alex's sister apathetic and unhelpful in the charade? Or was she the Only Sane Woman who is already troubled with being a single mother whose degree is suddenly useless? Alex's sarcasm on her job at Burger King seems pretty tasteless, given that with their mother gone she needs an income to raise her daughter.
    • Along with Ariane, does her boyfriend Rainer deserve most of the snark from Alex? The guy puts up with their charade despite the fact that life in DDR is completely foreign to him, is shown to be supportive of his girlfriend and a scene sees him feeding his new stepdaughter, all things that are pretty remarkable for such a young guy.
    • The Reveal that she was planning to flee to the West with her husband and got cold feet at the last moment gives a new perspective to Christiane's motivations. Was she really a true believer in the GDR or she was just pretending to be one to shield her children from the less pleasant aspects of life under Communism, especially when one of the member of the family was a defector?
  • Awesome Music:
    • During 'General Secretary' Jähn's address to the nation, the national anthem of East Germany plays in the background of the speech, keeps playing after the television is switched off, and then swells to a crescendo as the scene shifts to the Reunification celebrations.
    • The main theme by Yann Tiersen, which plays when Alex's mother sneaks out and sees for herself how Berlin has changed.
    • And the short, but touching, piano piece at the beginning and end of the film (Summer '78).
  • Ensemble Dark Horse: Alex's coworker Denis (an aspiring director who fakes several newscasts for Christiane) is well-liked for his willingness to help out with the hoax and the comic relief that he provides.
  • Retroactive Recognition: Thanks to Daniel Brühl's brilliant career in The New '10s, you'll probaly recognise Alex as Pvt Zoller from Inglourious Basterds, Niki Lauda from Rush (2013) or Helmut Zemo from Captain America: Civil War.
  • Signature Scene: Christiane watching the Lenin statue being taken away (with a framing that makes it look like the Lenin statue itself is bidding farewell) is the most iconic imagery of the film.
  • Squick: Ariane tells Alex that she saw their father at Burger King, and Alex pictures him as a morbidly-obese man shoveling cheeseburgers.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Many fans would have liked seeing Ariane's relationship with her estranged father develop more instead of only having them share a brief look or two while he mostly interacts with Alex.

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