This docudrama reveals the man behind the totalitarian system of the East German secret service “Stasi“: his motivation, his power, his career and his failure.

Before the Berlin Wall fell, Erich Mielke was the most feared man in East Germany. He created the East German “Stasi” and, for over four decades, ruled this most perfidious and effective secret service: 300.000 men, women and children, to control a population of 17 million. Fear was key to the efficiency of the Stasi, and Mielke was the master of fear. Who was Erich Mielke, what was the secret to his power?

The producers got into exclusive possession of the eight psychiatric examinations reports which were secretly made after Mielke’s arrest in 1990. These materials form the basis for “Erich Mielke – The Master of Fear”. Drama combined with archive sequences shows the two sides to the personality of Mielke: as one of the most influential decision-makers behind the Iron Curtain, and as the broken man that he became in prison in 1991, reflecting his dreams, his believes and his defeat in conversations with a psychologist.

This film is a condensed story of Cold War Europe from the standpoint of one of its darkest and most powerful personalities.