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I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

A harrowing ordeal...as any good movie that explores the world of drug addiction should be. Quite graphic in its depiction of the consequences of drug addiction, and the heartbreaking, and seemingly unbreakable, bonds involved. Just when you think someone is about to break free, they get sucked back in. Very sad, and frustrating.About as searingly graphic, if not more, as Requiem for a Dream, another excellent movie that should convince anyone who watches it to avoid the scourge that is drugs. Another movie you wouldn't want to watch too frequently, due to its gruesome honesty and the fact that the images are burned into your brain.Excellent soundtrack from David Bowie, including live concert footage. Most of the songs are from his Heroes album, which was written and recorded in West Berlin, and conveys the feelings that living in West Berlin evoked in Bowie. Ideal soundtrack then for Christiane F, being set in West Berlin.

Christiane F. is a movie that really catches the kind of melancholic and sad atmosphere of run-down suburbs and of its dwellers. The scenes are sometimes crude when, for example, Christiane and her boyfriend Detlef, in the attempt of getting clean from drugs, spend an entire night suffering for their effort not to do heroin: they sweat, they curse, they drink and then they vomit. Therefore the scenes are realistic, direct and truly engaging. The daily life of 14 years-old kids sadly rolls out with prostitution to buy drugs and doing drugs. But the saddest thing is that this vicious circle seems far from ending, as the drug-addicted youngsters seem to be too weak to overcome their addiction that will inevitably lead to death for some of them.

We don't hear as much about drug addiction now. Sadly, it seems to have become accepted more in the collective conscious of society, and I think that's a very bad development. Drugs and drug addiction continue to pull unwitting people into their web, often permanently. This movie, "Christane F.", is an exceptional movie on the horrors of drug addiction. A key part of that is having the human side of the issue in clear focus all the time.Christiane is a bored, aimless teenager in West Berlin in the 70s. I remember what it was like being a teenager. Suddenly, the comfort of being a kid was taken from you, and you were exposed to the real world and all of its difficult realities. That's enough to make anyone jaded, and there is nothing for Christiane to do in the boring apartment neighbourhood where she lives. She escapes her day-to-day life through the music of her idol, David Bowie. Desperate to feel alive, she has her eye on a new disco called The Sound. Even though too young to enter, she gets her friend to take her. But this new disco turns out to be a seedy teen hangout full of drugs and dealers. Christiane meets a guy there and falls in love with him. She'll do anything to keep this positive new influence in her life - even if that means sink into the world of drugs that he's slowly sinking into.This film hits close to home because of how utterly real it feels. You even come to understand, if not agree with, why Christiane chooses her path. After she falls in with her new clique of friends, there is an exhilarating scene of them running around Berlin, aimlessly and high on their freedom. David Bowie's "Heroes" plays throughout. These kids desperately want to escape their dark and dreary realities. Too bad that they end up choosing a means of escape that plunges them into an even darker reality. Frighteningly, and humanly, the characters are fully aware of their addictions. They just can't find the spirit to do anything about it.One particular scene is terrifying. Christiane and her boyfriend are locked in her mother's bedroom while cold turkey floods through them. The agony they project is quite hard to stomach, even when they're not coughing up blood. This drug destroys their lives, if not just their bodies, and while they know and want to escape their heroin addiction, their human insecurities make it difficult to do so. Slowly, indeed, they become less and less human in their constant search for the next fix.The actors were astonishing, so utterly believable, showing talent way beyond their years. "Christiane F." is a frightening, sadly relevant movie about one of the darkest side-effects of society, and the deeply human turmoil that lands people there - often permanently. Fortunately, Christiane ultimately managed to escape her drug addiction, and hopefully this autobiographical story will keep other wayward kids from following her path.

This movie came to my attention many years ago when I got the soundtrack from a dear friend to whom I still talk to, as a gift. I later went on to downed the actual movie many, many years later and was amazed at it's withdrawal scenes. As this movie centers around drug use and it's life altering after effects. David Bowie makes a cameo in this and does most of the soundtrack. A great German made movie so if you don't mind subs and are inclined to this genre of movie I highly recommend it!It does get ugly as heroin addiction will tend to do but in my eyes and opinion it is one of the best representations of the life addicts live or die within. Also it is based on a true story and at the end tells you what happened to all of the key players. Which may surprise you in the end, If you google this movie and the movies key people in it you'll be surprised to know Christiane F. lives onto some sobriety but in the end succumbs to a struggle back and forth with sobriety. Great cast of unknown German actors and well done storyline in my opinion for a subject that is usually treated by Hollywood with much undertones. This movie puts it right in your face and lets you see heroin addiction for all of it's soul stealing wickedness!