Stierlitz and romantic love

How a serious surgery makes you a true romantic

I have been recovering from knee replacement surgery and going through a somewhat expected physical and emotional roller coaster.

Last night, in my dreams, I vividly heard a song from an old Russian series, Seventeen Moments of Spring (1971–1972).

It went like (translated by my friend chatGPT):

I ask, even if just for a little while,
My pain, leave me,
As a cloud, a grayish cloud,
Fly to my native home,
From here to my native home.

My shore, appear in the distance
With an edge, a thin line,
My shore, my gentle shore,
Ah, if only I could swim to you,
Swim to you, at least someday.

Somewhere far away,
Somewhere far away
Mushroom rains are falling,
Right by the river
In a small garden
Cherries have ripened,
Bending down to the ground.

Somewhere far away
In my memory
Right now, it's warm like in childhood,
Even though the memory is covered
By such deep snows.

The dream itself wasn’t related to the song but was colorful and beautiful. That’s always a sign of me getting better. But the song brought back a memory of a very famous scene in the movie.

The protagonist, Stierlitz, is a Soviet spy in Nazi Germany—handsome, elegant, ironic, cerebral—played by the widely popular actor Vyacheslav Tikhonov. His picture is shown below. He has been embedded in Germany and hasn’t seen his wife for many, many years.

Just before an important and dangerous assignment, the Russian authorities (famous for their sensitivity :-) decided to allow Stierlitz to see his wife. They brought her to Berlin, to a café they knew he frequented—without telling him.

His wife, accompanied by a Russian officer in disguise, walks in, and Stierlitz sees her immediately. She doesn’t yet know he’s there. She is shy and sad and is shown to the table. Her companion orders coffee, and she keeps looking at the door, hoping to see her husband walk in.

At some point, she is told he is already inside—and she looks straight at him. They lock eyes, and for several minutes the camera just switches between their faces.

The music (the melody is from the song which was in my dream), and these human eyes, are so full of life, and meaning, and love.

I knew I was super sensitive—due to my recovery (lots of time alone, slow chores, and fighting pain)—to react so strongly to something many people would find corny or unrealistic.

I teared up along with Stierlitz, who nervously smoked (as did the second comrade), and I admired the creators of the movie. They clearly believed in romantic love. They showed two people keeping their connection across time and space—two humans devoted to each other, loving and trusting, hurting and hoping.

I immediately thought of entangled quantum objects, of course :-) Merged by love into togetherness and keeping it against all odds.

Here is the scene. If you don’t cry, you either don’t have a heart—or haven’t recently undergone a knee replacement.