Berlin-Milieu. Ackerstraße 1973
Veronika Otten (Editor)
The film document Berlin-Milieu. Ackerstraße 1973, edited by Veronika Otten, is visible evidence that the SFD made use of its privilege to document taboo subjects. The film editor portrays the day-to-day life of Berliners who live in the border zone next to the Berlin Wall. She shows detailed, soundless images of East German border protection systems and offers brief insights into an »antisocial environment«, as it is referred to in an insert title. Neither the film images in Ackerstraße nor their form of presentation without commentary or other reception-controlling means would have been conceivable in the DEFA and TV films that were being produced at the same time.
Veronika Otten (Editor)
Veronika Otten, who was born in the early 1940s and died in 2012, worked for the State Film Documentation almost from the start. Originally a graphic designer, she joined the group in 1971, continuing to work there until 1982. Under her editorial direction, personal documentations, mostly artist portraits, and numerous film documentaries about the dereliction of old buildings in Berlin-Mitte were produced.