Christiane F. [Region 2]

This was my first time of realizing restrictions via Region. Here in Texas, which I guess is Region 1 with the rest of the US. And Region 2 includes Germany. Some corporate rule making has cleverly made Region 2 DVD's not playable in basic Region 1 DVD players. Strangely, the DVD plays on my Macbook laptop from 2010. Semi proprietory controls.The movie itself is pretty stark. The David Bowie soundtrack is impressively appropriate, David like the Pied Piper, part of the enticement of a sordid lifestyle of excessive drugs, bleak lives, sex for drug money. The irony is that Bowie survived his own similar excesses, and in his later life admitted all that experimenting wasn't all that satisfying and he ended up preferring a more sedentary lifestyle, free of drugs, careful with friends, though his art continued to be underworldly.The notes to the making of the movie are worth reading in Extra Features. We are a strange creature, where Heroin takes people to a satisfaction that seems to outdo normal being, and yet, it's easily overindulged which sets into play an unsustainable conflict between H's appeal va being "clean." Young people milling around, looking for experience, liberation, nirvana, bliss that takes them out of the world, while reducing their interest and ability to be in the world.The moral of the story could be learning moderation. Many of the elders in Asia take heroin as a daily relaxant over years and manage to have relatively balanced lives. But the Western propaganda is to make drugs against the law, which temps adventure seekers and rebels and hypes the addict scenario. The withdrawel arc in the movie was maybe a bit overdone. And using other drugs to help the transition to "clean" seems also part of the hype, get off one thing by getting on something else. We swing from wanting to walk on the wild side, to wanting to step simple and straight or check out altogether.

It is a really good movie ,give credit to the actress she made this movie very believable to the era it was portraying 1970 era was a big heroin and LSD ,pot ,I can attest to that I was coming of age than and know people that O D . all around the neighborhood and the worst thing she did was to put a needle in her arm when I seen this I knew that she would become a servant of the drug .the scenes are in a disco ,train stations ,small apt.,gritty rest rooms where they shoot up ,she ends up prostuting,and all to support the habitat ,and her boy friend who also sells his self to gay men, they show the horror of trying to kick by themselves ,they get clean and meet their friends and go for another shot and get rehooked again ,they end up homeless when their friend dies with a needle sticking in his arm ,end up in the apt.of a gay man the boy friends John ,,Christie runs away in the end she sees her girl friend dies of overdose in the news paper headlines she sees ,she ends up going to the country and cleans out the movie ends on that.good English sub tittles, hardly any nudity ,some under wear scenes of Christie with top on ,too graphic for children .

Before I get into the review I wanted to mention that I know a great deal about Christiane's life and story. I even managed the Christiane F. Official myspace profile before it was handed over to someone else to manage. Now this film is the most realistic film ever made about Heroin addiction. Christiane F. was filmed on Location in Germany, and many of the locations where the actual events took place were locations where the film was shot. Including of course Berlin's now infamous 'Bahnhof Berlin Zoologischer Garten'(Zoo Station), The place that inspired the first track of U2's Actung Baby album, and the location where Christiane and her friends scored and used heroin. Some of them(including Christiane and her boyfriend, Detlev)walked through the station selling their bodies as prostitutes to support their drug habbit. Christiane F. as a film is masterfully directed by Uli Edel. He spares no detail, and manages to create a grimly depressing, and extremely dark story about the world of Junkies unlike any film ever has before. David Bowie makes an appearance in the film, and compositions from several of his albums are used as the film's soundtrack. This is fitting because Christiane was a massive Bowie fan at the time. By the age of 14 Christiane Felscherinow had already used Marijuana, Speed, LSD, and Heroin. By 15 she was a hooker walking the streets of Berlin. This is truly the utlimate film about Heroin users, and it is a remarkable experience. If you can get past the sort of laughable dubbing you will discover a stark and powerfull film that will stay with you for a while. Natja Brunkhorst was excellent in the part of Christiane, and even looked very similar to the actual Christiane. This is about as realistic and grim as any film about drug users has ever dared to go.

Nunca me llegó el pedido!

Awesome dvd.

映画館で一度観たが 改めて怖さを感じた

The disc works perfectly, and the subtitles only let me down once. This film is breathtaking in its approach to a complex set of circumstances that Christiane finds herself in, at the tender age of twelve. Disconnected from her poor quality neighbourhood and disparate family, in spite of her loving mother's best efforts, and feeling the tempestuous onset of adolescence, she reaches out to her seemingly more assured classmate, and the scene that she inhabits. It is Berlin, in the early 1980's and the scene is one of the heaviest club scenes in the world. There is a heady mix of drugs, hardcore music, and prostitution. Christiane falls in love with a slightly older boy. She is staying out all night at weekends. Someone offers her a pill, her hero, David Bowie, plays a concert, she collapses on her bathroom floor after injecting "H" (heroin), and her mother helps her and her boyfriend get clean. But it is not so easy to stay away. Aged just fourteen, she has become a prostitute, and it takes a tragedy for her to find the strength she needs.

Saw this film back in 81 in Canada and what an impact it had. So with Bowie passing it was time to see this film again. It's in German with English sub titles and that's fine because the acting more than makes up for words. The film hasn't lost its impact after all these years. It's very sad that the real Christiane F is still addicted to H and realeased her second book a couple of years ago about her life since Zoo Station, but not in English print yet. So the film is a keeper.