After the two marry, Agnes is drawn to the communist cause, and begins acting in East German films, which her husband views as sheer propaganda, especially when she recites a poem praising Stalin.
[2] Assistant-director Siegfried Hartmann told an interviewer that the film was made when the Cold War turned into a grim reality, and when Joseph Stalin's cult of personality was at its height, with both those factors heavily influencing the picture.
[5] The West German Der Spiegel commented that "Maetzig's work was too 'progressive' even for the party hard-liners" and quoted DEFA official Albert Wilkening who disapproved of the picture, saying that "unfortunately, there is still much rigidity in our film industry".
[6] Peter C. Rollins and John E. O'Connor described Story of A Young Couple as "painfully true to the party line";[7] according to Alexander Stephan, it also contained anti-American rhetoric typical to the time.
[9] John Griffith Urang noted that rather than have love transcend politics, as was the case in Maetzig's Marriage in the Shadows, Story of A Young Couple had the protagonists' romantic relations depend on their world view.