Julius Weigel

An art student, a real estate agent and two lovers cling to their carefully crafted facades – or fail to do so.

What does it mean to live in a neighborhood? What does the place where you live mean to you? Who lives next-door? In the summer of 2017, 140 people who live on and around Rosa-Luxemburg Platz in Berlin's 'Mitte' district were interviewed. These conversations were turned into a series of short films that provide personal insights into diverse lives. Behind each door there's a different story: long-standing Mitte dwellers, founders of start-ups, centenarians, globetrotters, those pining for the old East Germany, and students. There are people who have lived here for two months or sixty years; people who grew up in what used to be East or West Germany, in Latin America, Russia, or former Yugoslavia. A neighborhood full of diversity and contradictions. Some call it their home, others just the place they live, while still others think of it as a real neighborhood or 'kiez'. And yet, memories and emotions associated with this place connect them all as neighbors.

A workaholic advertising executive in her mid-30s begins to hear a voice in her head the day before a presentation, which attempts to shake up the banality of her everyday life. She views the outside world through sober eyes, while the protagonist's introspection and her romantic, nature-loving escapism describe a situation that initially seems hopeless.

A narrator shares two memories. In the process of repeating them in rotation they seem to get charged by ideas of romantic popular culture. The images in this one lead to the understanding that everyone is in the center of their surroundings.