Uli Edel directs Natja Brunckhorst, Eberhard Auriga and David Bowie in this hard hitting true tale of a 13 year old who gets hooked on heroin and then turns to prostitution in Berlin.

When Christiane first goes to the Sound nightclub blatantly underage, her cooler friend tells her nobody is seen carrying a carrier bag around with them there. By the end the only thing she has left is a wispy carrier bag she never seemingly lets go off. This is a grubby film. Wine vomit. Blood being sluiced out of syringes. Scabby forced handjobs. The descent into drugs is realistic. There is no villainous peer pressure. It is part of the subculture these kid enters into, and after a couple half hearted objections from those a few months further down the tracks she just starts doing it. A little heartbroken, she feels alienated, there is nothing else to do. Same with the prostitution and the squalid living. It is a pattern that already exists, a crack that many just fall into as it is… there. Some fun at the start – rebellious freedom and young love. The final trudge through the underground station full of underage zombies feels inevitable. Surprisingly non political given Berlin’s unique situation in the Seventies, the one moment of explicit commentary is what happens on the morning after her first whole night out. The mother of her friend punishes her child, admonishes our doomed protagonist unfairly for being a bad influence. At home, Christiane avoids any noticeable consequences. Well made, stark, you wouldn’t rush to watch it twice.

6

Perfect Double Bill: Last Exit To Brooklyn (1990)