Die letzten Jahre der Kindheit

A remarkable and excellent film. This movie visualises and exposes the gap between a child's needs and the state's ability and/or desire to provide for those needs. West Germany in 1979 is an advanced society that provides many different options for wayward kids to get back onto the path of normalised behaviour. These options are provided by different institutions and thereby lies the problem exposed by this film, that the institutions lack flexibility. It becomes clear that a child's recovery relies on bespoke processes being put in place, not the child having to fit into one unyielding programme after another. No amount of meetings about what to do with troubled teens like Martin (brilliantly played by Gerhard Gundel) can improve his experience of incarceration in these institutions whilst the bullying and rigidity of the process isn't tackled. Martin Sonntag is a wayward 14 year old brought up in poverty. School absence and petty crime cause him to end up in several institutions. The inability of those in charge to understand Martin's needs and the failure of the very few who recognise the problem to be able change anything, lead slowly and inexorably to Martin's increased internalisation and a tragic conclusion.