Never Look Away

Never Look Away follows Kurt Barnert, an artist who grows up in Germany during the Nazi era and later in East Germany, then flees to the West to study painting and work without the constraints placed on him at home. His childhood experiences and the political systems he escaped continue to affect him. He falls in love with a fellow student, Ellie, whose father, the physician Carl Seeband, opposes their relationship. Unknown to the couple, Seeband's past is bound up with a crime committed decades earlier that also touched Kurt's own family. Kurt eventually confronts this history through his painting, producing work that speaks to the experience of his generation.

Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck directed and wrote the film, his third feature after The Lives of Others (2006) and The Tourist (2010), and he also produced it with Max Wiedemann and Quirin Berg. Tom Schilling plays the adult Kurt, with Sebastian Koch as Seeband, Paula Beer as Ellie, Saskia Rosendahl as Kurt's aunt Elisabeth, Oliver Masucci as Antonius van Verten, and Cai Cohrs as the young Kurt. The film runs 188 minutes and was made for about 18 million USD, with a worldwide box office of roughly 5 million. On IMDb it holds 7.7/10 from 28,000 votes and on TMDB 7.7/10 from 773 votes, while a critics' rating stands at 7.4/10 from 140 reviews.