- Michael: I'm not frightened. I'm not frightened of anything. The more I suffer, the more I love. Danger will only increase my love. It will sharpen it, it will give it spice. I will be the only angel you need. You will leave life even more beautiful than you entered it. Heaven will take you back and look at you and say: Only one thing can make a soul complete, and that thing is love.
- Hanna Schmitz: It doesn't matter what I feel. It doesn't matter what I think. The dead are still dead.
- Michael: I don't know what to say. I've never been with a woman before. We've been together four weeks, and I can't live without you. I can't. Even the thought of it kills me.
- Professor Rohl: Societies think they operate by something called morality, but they don't. They operate by something called law. You're not guilty of anything merely by working at Auschwitz. Eight thousand people worked at Auschwitz. Precisely 19 have been convicted, and only six for murder. To prove murder, you have to prove intent. That's the law. The question is never was it wrong, but was it legal. And not by our laws. No. By the laws at the time.
- Michael: I didn't mean to upset you.
- Hanna Schmitz: You don't have the power to upset me. You don't matter enough to upset me.
- Rose Mather: People ask all the time what I learned in the camps. But the camps weren't therapy. What do you think these places were? Universities? We didn't go there to learn. One becomes very clear about these things. What are you asking for? Forgiveness for her? Or do you just want to feel better yourself? My advice, go to the theatre, if you want catharsis. Please. Go to literature. Don't go to the camps. Nothing comes out of the camps. Nothing.
- [last lines]
- Michael Berg: I was fifteen. I was coming home from school. I was feeling ill. And a woman helped me.
- Professor Rohl: You have been skipping seminars.
- Michael: I have a piece of information, concerning one of the defendants. Something they do not admitting.
- Professor Rohl: What information? You don't need to tell me. It's perfectly clear you have a moral obligation to disclose it to the court.
- Michael: It happens this information is favorable to the defendant. It can help her case. It may even affect the outcome, certainly the sentencing.
- Professor Rohl: So?
- Michael: There's a problem. The defendant herself is determined to keep this information secret.
- Professor Rohl: What are her reasons?
- Michael: Because she's ashamed.
- Professor Rohl: Ashamed of what? Have you spoken to her?
- Michael: Of course not.
- Professor Rohl: Why "of course not"?
- Michael: I can't. I can't do that. I can't talk to her.
- Professor Rohl: What we feel isn't important. It's utterly unimportant. The only question is what we do. If people like you don't learn from what happened to people like me, then what the hell is the point of anything?
- Young Ilana Mather: [Testifying in court] Each of the guards would choose a certain number of women. Hanna Schmitz chose differently.
- Judge: In what way differently?
- Young Ilana Mather: She had favourites. Girls, mostly young. We all remarked on it, she gave them food and places to sleep. In the evening, she asked them to join her. We all thought - well, you can imagine what we thought. Then we found out - she was making these women read aloud to her. They were reading to her. At first we thought this guard... this guard is more sensitive... she's more human... she's kinder. Often she chose the weak, the sick, she picked them out, she seemed to be protecting them almost. But then she dispatched them. Is that kinder?
- Teacher: The notion of secrecy is central to western literature. You may say, the whole idea of character is defined by people holding specific information which for various reasons, sometimes perverse, sometimes noble, they are determined not to disclose.
- Michael Berg: I'm aware I was difficult. I wasn't always open with you. I'm not open with anyone.
- Julia: I knew you were distant. You know, I always assumed it was my fault.
- Michael Berg: Julia. How wrong can you be.
- Michael: I sat in the second carriage because I thought you might kiss me.
- Hanna Schmitz: Kid, you thought we could make love in a tram?
- Michael: Is it true what you said? That I don't matter to you?
- Hanna Schmitz: [shakes head]
- Michael: Do you forgive me?
- Hanna Schmitz: [nods]
- Michael: Do you love me?
- Hanna Schmitz: [nods]
- Michael: [reading from "Lady Chatterley's Lover"] "Lady Chatterley felt his naked flesh against her as he came into her. For a moment, he was still inside her..."
- Hanna Schmitz: This is disgusting. Where did you get this?
- Michael: I borrowed it from someone at school.
- Hanna Schmitz: Well, you should be ashamed.
- [pauses]
- Hanna Schmitz: Go on.
- Michael: What's your name?
- Hanna Schmitz: What?
- Michael: Your name.
- Hanna Schmitz: Why do you want to know?
- Michael: I've been here three times. I want to know your name. What's wrong with that?
- Hanna Schmitz: Nothing, kid. There's nothing wrong with that. It's Hanna.
- Michael: You looked so suspicious.
- Hanna Schmitz: What's yours, kid?
- Michael: Michael.
- Hanna Schmitz: Michael. So I'm with a Michael.
- Michael: What are you doing? What is this? Why did you behave as if you didn't know me?
- Hanna Schmitz: You didn't want to know me! You could see I was in the first carriage. So why did you get on the second?
- Michael: What did you think I was doing? Why the hell did you think I was there?
- Hanna Schmitz: How should I know? I've been working. I need a bath, and I'd like to be by myself. Would you please leave?
- Michael: I didn't mean to upset you.
- Hanna Schmitz: You don't have the power to upset me. You don't matter enough to upset me.
- Hanna Schmitz: Do you have a book?
- Michael: Yes, I have. I took one with me this morning.
- Hanna Schmitz: What is it?
- Michael: The Odyssey by Homer. It's my homework.
- Hanna Schmitz: We're changing the order we do things. Read to me first, kid. Then we make love.
- Michael: What's wrong now?
- Hanna Schmitz: Nothing's wrong. Nothing.
- Michael: You know, you never ask. You never bother to ask how *I* am!
- Hanna Schmitz: You never say.
- Michael: It just happens to be my birthday. It's my birthday, that's all! In fact, you've never even asked when it is!
- Hanna Schmitz: You want a fight, kid!
- Michael: No, I don't want a fight! What's wrong with you?
- Hanna Schmitz: What business is it of yours?
- Michael: Always on your terms, everything. What you want, it's always what *you* want. My friends were giving me a party.
- Hanna Schmitz: Then why are you here then? Go back to your party. Is that what you want?
- Michael: I brought you these flowers. To say thank you.
- Hanna Schmitz: Put them over there in the sink.
- Michael: I would've come earlier but I've been in bed for three months.
- Hanna Schmitz: You are better now?
- Michael: Yes, thank you.
- Hanna Schmitz: Have you always been weak?
- Michael: Oh no, I've never been sick before. It's incredibly boring. There's nothing to do. I couldn't even be bothered to read.
- [first lines]
- Brigitte: You didn't wake me.
- Michael Berg: You were sleeping.
- Brigitte: You let me sleep because you can't bear to have breakfast with me.
- Michael: [from the theatrical trailer] .
- [At the Tram Terminal]
- Michael: [in insistent upset voice] I'm looking for Hanna Schmitz!
- Tram Supervisor: Schmitz has left.
- Michael: [surprised and even more upset] LEFT?
- Michael: Here, let me show you where we're going.
- Hanna Schmitz: It's okay, kid. I don't want to know.
- Hanna Schmitz: You're good at it, aren't you?
- Michael: Good at what?
- Michael: Reading.
- Hanna Schmitz: What's funny?
- Michael: I didn't think I was good at anything.
- Michael: Like this?
- Hanna Schmitz: That's right. Mmm. Ah-ah. No, not so fast. Ah-Ah. Mmm. Mmm. Ah! It's all right. Do it again. Mmm. Oh! Oh!
- Hanna Schmitz: I'll get you a towel. So that's why you came back.
- Michael: You're so beautiful.
- Hanna Schmitz: What are you talking about?
- [kiss]
- Hanna Schmitz: Look at me, kid. Mmm! Mmm! Slowly. Slowly...
- Michael: It's always me that has to apologize.
- Hanna Schmitz: You don't have to apologize. No one has to apologize. War and Peace, kid.
- Dieter: I started out believing in this trial. I thought it was great. Now, I think it's - it's just a diversion.
- Professor Rohl: Yes? Diversion from what?
- Dieter: You choose six women, you put them on trial, you say, "They were the evil ones, they were the *guilty* ones." Because one of the victims happened to write a book. That's why they're on trial and nobody else! Do you know how many camps there were in Europe? People go on about how much did everyone know? Who knew? What did they know? Everyone knew! Our parents, our teachers. That isn't the question! The question is, "How could you let this happen?" And better, "Why didn't you kill yourself when you found out?" Thousands. That's how many there were. Thousands of camps. *Everyone* knew.
- Hanna Schmitz: We were guards. Our job was to guard the prisoners. We couldn't just let them escape.
- Judge: I see. And if they escaped, then you'd be blamed, you'd be charged.
- Hanna Schmitz: No.
- Judge: You might even be executed?
- Hanna Schmitz: No!
- Judge: Well, then?
- Hanna Schmitz: If we'd opened the doors, there would have been chaos. How could we have restored order? It happened so fast. It was snowing. The bombs. The flames. There were flames all over the village. Then the screaming began, and got worse and worse. And if they'd all come rushing out, we couldn't just let them escape. We couldn't. We were responsible for them!
- Judge: Did you not realize - that you were sending these women to their deaths?
- Hanna Schmitz: Yes, but they were new arrivals, new women were arriving all the time. So, the old ones had to make room for the new ones.
- Judge: I'm not sure you understand.
- Hanna Schmitz: We couldn't keep everyone. There wasn't room.
- Judge: No. But what I'm saying - let me rephrase: To make room, you were picking women out and saying, "You, you and you have to be sent back to be killed."
- Hanna Schmitz: Well, what would you have done?
- [long pause]
- Hanna Schmitz: Should I never have signed up at Siemens?