Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Asad Almond A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

Stephanie There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Scotty Burke It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

jcappy "The State I Am In" stands on its own as a superior character study, but for me the cast was superior to the script. Julia Hummer, Barbara Auer, and Richie Muller are the perfect actors for a politically radical "family" permanently on the lam. However, the Clara and Hans roles might benefit from a little more background and Jeanne, especially Jeanne, Clara's daughter and the film's protagonist, seems too conventional for someone in her position. Revising Jeanne by just one character substitute would makes the film more convincing, original, adult, and subversive. It's hard for me to believe that a 15 year old teen who has lived her entire life in the underground with two revolutionary adults should be cast in so discordant a frame. Why is a typical romance at the center of her break out world? Why at 15 is she jealous of her mother's love-making; why is this the passion she must realize rather than say a passion for justice? Why does she have more diffidence in the young man's presence than in that of her "parents?" Given that the German Internal Security Forces are moving in on these dear three, how is this the moment for her confrontation with Clara and Hans? And why does she seem a bit too middle class, spoiled, and ultimately too destructive to be the daughter of a radical couple? In contrast, the Clara and Hans roles are more convincing. They seem to be what their lives have dictated. They are disciplined, adult, competent, intelligent, and rarely and only momentarily under the sway of their emotions. They work together and hard to build a life despite their isolation; they accept that theirs is not the loving relationship that might belong to them in a different world; and most critically, it is their sense of leadership and equality that holds them together. As does their mutual love for Clara's daughter, from whom they expect a lot in the way of learning, mature discernment, and discipline.But Jeanne more often than not, does not seem to be a reflection of Clara and Hans, nor of their hard earned independence and values. She only partly flourishes under her "parents" mutual respect and love for her. She time and time again risks her "family's" safety for the sake of a little romance/sex. Why doesn't she feel more deprived by her lack of social world, recognition, or opportunities for practicing the social justice Clara and Hans gave up their freedom for? Of course, the Jeanne of the film is possible, but it seems to me this film would have been much more challenging if she were cast as a social actor of some kind. This is a political, not a psychological threesome. Her blossoming independence needs to find realization in something to at least match the seriousness of her life and parents, say a trustworthy friend, or some other connection that drives her outside her troubled mind. If her parents opposed corporate domination she perhaps could be shown opposing male dominationREVISION: Substitute for the dime store romance a close friendship with a truly independent young woman her age. (perhaps the interesting teenager who directly approaches her to attend the school film) The break out would center around this budding friendship. Say this young woman has a friend who is being sexually harassed by her teacher or coach, and she decides to organize a protest on her behalf. Jeanne decides to attend it, is arrested, spends a little time with her friend in the clinker and while out on bail, Internal Security closes in on her, Clara and Hans. In an ensuing chase, they make it across the border, Jeanne from the backseat puts one arm around Hans, one around Clara, their heads squeezed together in a bobbing embrace as their white Opel put-puts down the road. Curtains. An end with no betrayal, no requisite deaths of the revolutionaries. All the irresolutional conflicts which beset the three would at least for the time find respite. Jeanne would answer her search for all that already existed within her in both her friend's world and in Clara and Hans. And a sense of promise would enter the lives of those who have been sentenced to none.

hasosch Formally, "Die Innere Sicherheit" is a road-movie, it shows in a kind of natural suspense the life of a young family, of Hans and Carla and their 15years old daughter Jeanne (who is supposed to have a French name but mispronounces it). The family has never rest, the flight is how they are living. When they sleep, one of them has always to stay awake in order to pay attention if nobody shows up. Although the movie does not give any hints in which time the story plays, it is to assume that it is contemporaneous with the time when the movie was shot, thus in 2000. Hans and Carla are terrorists and work in the "underground". From the commentary of the director, Christian Petzold, we learn that they belong to the RAF (Red Army Fraction) who was responsible for many assassinations and other terrorist acts in the 70ies and 80ies. The RAF itself was convinced that Germany is ruled by the successors of the Nazis and therefore the government is illegal. However, Hans and Carla seem to be decades too late, they appear in their present like lost from their past, more precisely: lost in transition before their enemies who would treat them like normal criminals in order not to glorify the Baader-Meinhof clan. When Hans and Carla need help and contact their former collaborators, it turns out that they are either since long time not in business anymore or turned in their hopelessness into drinkers. (I am convinced that in the character of Klaus a once very famous German publisher is accurately portrayed: He ended on a park bench in the "Tiergarten" with bottles of red wine around him.) For the daughter, however, the life of her parents becomes more and more intolerable. She cannot make any friends, and when she does, she does not see them anymore, because the steady flight is moving them from nowhere to nowhere. She cannot go regularly to school and is taught basically by her mother. Although the parents are supposed to be adherents of the once famous "laissez-faire"-education, they use police-interrogation methods when they want to find out whom Jeanne contacted and with whom she slept. Both parents smoke, but the daughter is not supposed to. Some of the former RAF-adherents have turned into Neo-Nazis.I recommend this movie highly. The story develops out of itself, there are no commentaries, no artificially built-in suspense, no pretentiousness. It is true, the movie is dark and depressive, but also soothingly anti-Hollywood. Christian Petzold has already given us such excellent movies like "Cuba Libre", "Wolfsburg", "Toter Mann", the marvelous "Yella" and, most lately, "Jerichow" which is to appear on DVD. So I am looking forward to the upcoming works of this highly promising director.

film_riot With „Die innere Sicherheit" Christian Petzold, German director, brings us an interesting piece of cinema. It's the study of the 15-year-old girl Jeanne (Julia Hummer), whose parents are both living underground, and what this means for her life, mainly in terms of first love or personality development. Petzold is able to create a kind of tense atmosphere. The viewer feels sorry for Jeanne, but at the same time you can understand why she is so loyal to her parents. They are simply the only persons that really know her. Through their constant moving she has no one else, so she has to protect the only relationship she has. For a period of time, she thinks she has found another person to trust in Heinrich, but he can't handle this difficult situation. Julia Hummer delivers an outstanding performance, while there are some flaws throughout the movie in the storyline of the parents (played by Richi Müller and Barbara Auer).

tomg-8 And finally there is a movie which does not need to explain in all details. Read the summary and see this movie ... you still will have your own explanations and opinions about this movie. Not as we know it from the 'American' or 'Hollywood' productions where it is so obvious what the intention of the story is. Not as we know it from the 'American' or 'Hollywood' productions with big fire-explosion climaxes. A good description for this story is maybe 'Sober'. But .. I have to admit, the life of a family-on-the-run-for-the-bad-guys is maybe displayed as a bit romantic, and maybe a bit unrealistic. Still I would recommend this movie, for a late Saturday night.