Posts

Showing posts from January, 2023

Zoo Station, A Memoir, The Story of Christiane F - Book Review

Image
People who are clean and sober wonder what the factors are that would draw a kid in their early teens into the drug scene.   Poverty is the usual answer, and it’s true, but do we really know what poverty is?   It isn’t just a lack of money, or the negligence of a child’s parents.   It often takes root in the simple fact that a child may live in a building complex where there is no playground. Zoo Station, A Memoir  (1978) is based on a series of articles in Stern magazine where the main interviewee is one teenager going by the name Christiane F.   She methodically goes through her youth from the age of six to fourteen where abuse and deprivation molded her into a junkie and a prostitute. Her family came from a rural area in Germany.   Christiane, her sister, and her mother were led to West Berlin by her father who boasted of a new opportunity of founding a telephone dating service.   Christiane’s father rented a large apartment with promises of making it big.   As an aside, Christiane

Christiane F. - Wir Kinder Vom Bahnhof Zoo (1981).

Image
After reviewing the 2021 Amazon miniseries Wir Kinder Vom Bahnhof Zoo , I decided to travel back in time about 40 years to 1981, when the first film incarnation of the same title was made.   From the wayback machine, I present Christiane F. - Wir Kinder Vom Bahnhof Zoo .   I will refer to the 1981 film as Christiane F. so as to avoid confusion.   Most importantly I will do my best to focus on the 1981 film without drawing comparisons with the 2021 iteration. How I managed to purchase a copy of 1981’s Christiane F. is an adventure in and of itself.   My search for the film on Amazon came up dry, leading me to the 2021 miniseries.   After finishing the series, I widened my net beyond Amazon in search of the movie.   I found a BluRay copy for online purchase from Walmart. You heard me.   Walmart . Let that sink in. The title read in what turned out to be Catalan Spanish:   Yo, Cristina F.   I checked in what regions it was playable.   It listed “Regiones A, B, C.”   Hoping “A” stood for R