Children Underground

Showing the horrendous effects of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu's oppressive regime, Edet Belzberg's CHILDREN UNDERGROUND is an unflinchingly brutal, eye-opening work of social commentary. Ceausescu's decision to ban contraception and abortion as a way of increasing the country's work force resulted in a generation of children born into a nearly incomprehensible state of poverty and destitution. CHILDREN UNDERGROUND focuses on five of these abandoned youths, who live, sleep, and scrounge for food in a Bucharest subway terminal. Cristina, the group's 16-year-old leader, shaves her head in order to pass as a male and avoid further sexual assaults. Mihai is an intelligent, charming 12-year-old who smokes cigarettes and dreams of a brighter future. Ten-year-old runaway Ana, too young to take care of herself, guards over her innocent younger brother Marian. And, finally, there is Macarena, a dazed, disoriented 14-year-old who inhales paint and fantasizes about a family that is waiting for her in a distant, nameless land. Belzberg's decision to remain behind the camera and not intervene in the children's lives adds an even greater despondency to the already hopeless proceedings, and while some viewers might wish to attack her for this seemingly criminal act of nonparticipation, she has left behind a haunting document that will hopefully help to bring about change for forgotten children all over the world.

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"...An intimate, relentlessly heartrending portrait....The faces and words of these unfortunate children will haunt the viewer long after the screen goes dark..." -- Sheri Linden , (Box Office)

"...The doc's very unsentimentality is its greatest strength....As it stands, it all but demands action..." -- Alice King , (Entertainment Weekly)

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