- Uncle Albrecht: Off to band practice. We are marching in the celebration parade. I don't know what we're celebrating, but we are marching.
- Walter Brunner: Tell me, what is it? Elsa? Berta? Maria?
- Ingeborg Schröder: Ingeborg.
- Walter Brunner: Oh, I'd like to get to know you better, Ingeborg.
- Kurt Schröder: Bambi, every time I look at you I think: such an innocent face and such a complicated woman.
- Bambi: You know what?
- Kurt Schröder: What?
- Bambi: You're a louse.
- Erika Jurgens: I understand. You have to be careful about what you say. I should be more careful too; but, I don't care! I hate it here. I hate living in this cage.
- [first lines]
- Narrator: August 13th, 1961, concrete and barbed wire divide Berlin. Against all treaties and agreements with the West, the Communist build a barrier closing off the eastern section of the city. More than one and one-half million men, women and children, imprisoned without benefit of trial. They have committed no crime. Sentence: life. Freedom is gained only at the risk of sudden death at the hands of machine-gun bearing border guards. The weak links on the barrier offer the last small avenues of escape are quickly sealed. A new phrase is added to archives of infamy: the Berlin Wall. Dividing not only Berlin; but, the free world from the prison state of Communism.
- Prof. Thomas Jurgens: I'm just nervous. I'm not a martyr. I've got a bible full of martyrs. Why do you need me?
- Prof. Thomas Jurgens: You believe in God. God is everywhere! Why must you go to church? Pray in the kitchen!
- Erika Jurgens: I've already caused you great trouble; but, I still wish you would tell me the truth. If - if you had a chance to get out, would you go?
- Ingeborg Schröder: What do you think?
- Mother Schröder: For myself, I've never cared much for traveling. But, I don't like being told where to go and where not to go.
- Ingeborg Schröder: Do you know I always thought these travel buses were the corniest thing in the world. Crowded busses jammed with people all going places. Now, I wouldn't mind being in one of those buses and I also wouldn't care where I was going.
- Mother Schröder: Don't forget to stop by the butcher on your way home. They might have sausage today.
- Ingeborg Schröder: Oh, is today Tuesday?
- Ingeborg Schröder: Another run. One of these days I would like to get my hands on the People's Kommissar of so-called nylon stockings.
- Erika Jurgens: You people are always saying something is impossible. Because it gives you an excuse for doing nothing. It's the same at home. All my father worries about is our fine furniture and his next promotion.
- Kurt Schröder: Your father is a very sensible man!
- Erika Jurgens: I don't want to live with that. I want to get away from everybody who accepts this world as if it were right and normal. I want to get out!
- Marga: I can't stand it. Every night alone. Lying there. My husband on the other side and me here with that wall. Oh, God! My God, I can't! I can't.
- Kurt Schröder: Excuse me, Major. I'm having a lot of trouble with the fan belt. But, it takes them such a long time to do anything at that garage.
- Major Eckhardt: So?
- Kurt Schröder: I've got a lot of stuff at home. If I could take the car for a few hours, I could fix it myself.
- Major Eckhardt: When?
- Kurt Schröder: Oh, any time. This evening!
- Major Eckhardt: Ah! This - eh - stuff you've got at home, Schröder, which is it? Blonde or brunette?
- Ingeborg Schröder: This week the water. Last week the electricity. How nice to have a planned economy.
- Erika Jurgens: Maybe we're crazy; but, the idea of being free is in our minds now. And in the end, we'll try!
- Kurt Schröder: Wait! If you really want to go across, I'll give you a little advice. You don't go over the wall and you don't go through. You go this way - under.
- Ingeborg Schröder: I'd like to soak in a hot bath - whenever I feel like it. And I mean hot! I'd like bath oils and big soft towels and big soft carpets all over the place. Yes! Yes! Yes!
- Erika Jurgens: Why does it happen so often that when I look at you I want to weep? What? What are you afraid of? That you let yourself believe in something and it may turn out to be a lie? You're playing a game. You're trying to be hard and cold and detached from it all. It doesn't fool me anymore.