The Child I Never Was (2002)
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78% of critics liked it
(9 reviews) -
54% of users liked it
(552 ratings)
A serial killer dispassionately discusses the nuts and bolts of his grisly avocation, as well as the youthful traumas which helped to mold him into a psychopath, in this disturbing independent drama from Germany, based on a true story. Young Jurgen Bartsch (Sebastian Urzendowsky) was raised in a… More A serial killer dispassionately discusses the nuts and bolts of his grisly avocation, as well as the youthful traumas which helped to mold him into a psychopath, in this disturbing independent drama from Germany, based on a true story. Young Jurgen Bartsch (Sebastian Urzendowsky) was raised in a family where his father (Walter Gontermann) barely acknowledged his existence and his mother (Ulrike Bliefert) displayed an inappropriate degree of affection toward him. When he reached puberty, Bartsch (played as a teenager by Tobias Schenke) was a young man confused and bitter about his growing sexual maturity, and possessing a deep hatred of those around him. Bartsch was a 15-year-old apprentice butcher when he kidnapped and murdered a young boy; he would kill three more boys in a similar fashion before he was captured by police in 1966. After he was found guilty, Bartsch carefully documented his childhood and his crimes in a series of letters and essays, and Ein Leben lang kurze Hosen tragen is drawn from his own words as it dramatizes his life and his crimes. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Directed By
- Kai S. Pieck
- Genres
- Art House & International, Drama
Unrated,
- In Theaters
- Jun 12, 2003 Wide
- Studio
- Strand Releasing
Critic Reviews
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Jan Stuart, Newsday
It's a surprisingly artful and discrete film.
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Ned Martel, New York Times
In the end Mr. Pieck and his intrepid lead actor piece together a constructive look at a lonely boy's damaged logic and its hideous results.
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Akiva Gottlieb, Village Voice
While the serial-killer sob story subgenre rarely yields a nuanced product, Kai S. Pieck's debut feature finds a plaintive, compelling route to the pathology of 1960s German child-killer Jürgen Bartsch.
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David Noh, Film Journal International
This deeply creepy fictionalized effort is anything but an entertainment, nor can it be considered art.
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Ken Fox, TV Guide's Movie Guide
By the film's end we feel neither sympathy nor, oddly, total disgust for this most loathsome of killers. We simply begin to understand, and perhaps that's achievement enough.
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Cast
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Tobias Schenke
as Jurgen Bartsch
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Sebastian Urzendowsky
as Young Jurgen Bartsch
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Ulrike Bliefert
as Mother
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Walter Gontermann
as Father
- Sebastian Ruger
- Hans-Joachim Kulenkampff
- Jurgen Christoph Kamcke
- Roland Riebeling
- Stephan Szasz
