Embassy of the United States, Berlin not be considered a capital until Berlin was unified. Relations with the East German state were hampered because of this policy, and by the erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961. The wall made the site of the former U.S. Embassy, still owned by the U.S. government, an inaccessible vacant lot that was part of the security zone separating east and west Berliners. The site became accessible after the Berlin Wall came down in November 1989, but remained a vacant lot until the 2004 groundbreaking for construction of a brand new U.S. Embassy. In the early 1970s the U.S., along
The Fall of Berlin (film) one of the first colored films made in the Soviet Union. The producers used Agfacolor reels, taken from UFA's studios in Neubabelsberg. Composer Dmitri Shostakovich, who was accused of Formalism during 1948, was called on to compose the score. Vano Muradeli said that his contribution to "The Fall of Berlin" and other Stalinist films was the only thing which saved him from persecution by the establishment. Riley wrote that the film's score, along with "Song of the Forests", "was the closest Shostakhovich came to overt praise for Stalin." One additional piece of music used in "The Fall of Berlin" was