THE SAME SKY
More4, 9pm
A PACY, compelling Cold War thriller set in Germany in 1974, when the country was still divided.
It begins at the Stasi Espionage Training Centre, where 25-yearold Lars Weber (Tom Schilling) is pulled out of his training course on seduction techniques.
He’s obviously doing pretty well, because he’s immediately sent to West Berlin on an assignment as a ‘Romeo’ spy.
He has to seduce a high-ranking intelligence analyst, Lauren Faber (Sofia Helin), a lonely 43-year-old divorcee with a troublesome son. He must feed back any intelligence gained to his contact.
Meanwhile, Lars’s father, Gregor, is an unofficial informant on his neighbours and proud that his son is spying for the state. However, his uncle Conrad, a teacher, has doubts about living
under a communist regime.
Elsewhere, there’s a subplot about an East German teen who has been selected for the elite swimming team, resulting in her family getting favours from the state.
This German language drama, written by a Brit, is worth paying the extra concentration required to keep up.