Christiane F.

El Biffo

Terrific kids-on-heroin film! Great withdrawal scene with projectile vomiting and scratching the wallpaper off the wall. Soundtrack/special appearance by David Bowie! First theatrical feature by Uli Edel (Last Exit to Brooklyn).

VincentVendetta

The sights of Berlin and the sounds of Bowie are great as always, but they cannot elevate another repetitive TV movie about the dangers of drug use, replaying the same songs, scenes, and dilemmas over and over. The young actors sure have the look, but they can't act the part to save their lives.

Henri de Corinth

2.5-ische...too dull and overlong to engage, and the 'dramatic' bits -the vomit, the neck thing, the girls fighting, etc.- are all really cartoonish...the Bowie cameo/concert is frankly a distraction. Nice footage of Berlin though.

Samuel T.

I wanted to like this so much, but the over-stylization (not to mention overdose of David Bowie (and I love David Bowie)) kept me at arms length from the get-go. Actually, the pop-syndrome aesthetic (I made that up) was so repulsive, it totally diffused the revolting narrative at hand. I felt nothing, not even the needle in the neck nor the projectile wine vomit.

Matt Burgess

Unflinching anti-drug film about a pretty 14 year old girl's descent into self-destruction that is never for a moment preachy or moralizing, very raw and harrowing especially the painful "cold turkey" scene. It is also beautifully filmed - a kind of dreamy artful teen angst later popularized by directors such as Lukas Moodysson and Sofia Coppola.

Anton Williams

I really like the 70s, Berlin, german train stations, David Bowie and other minimal stuff, but I hate all about drugs.

Pierluigi Puccini

A 14 year old playing with death in the heart of europe's capital of heroin. Verosimil, crude, and disturbing cinema vérité

ig_____or

@Berlin'18. Unbeknownst to me, some of the scenes took place in an area of Berlin that we visited on the exact same day that I watched this. It was a nice surprise taking the u-bahn at Kurfürstendamm station in the morning and then seeing it again, at night, on the film. Witnessing the self-destruction of Christiane and her friends was very sad and absorbing. Nice young cast and Bowie elevates everything.