When he is 14, Stefan’s parents decide to move the family to Marzahn, a desolate high-rise suburb of Berlin that is still under construction. Stefan’s innocent childhood suddenly ends when he encounters the bullying of an older boy and his gang.

Officials accused director Herrmann Zschoche and scriptwriter Ulrich Plenzdorf of giving a distorted, negative view of socialist reality. They required that the team make several edits and change the final scene, which in the original cut was open-ended.