As many as 20,000 girls and boys live rough in the streets of the Romanian capital city of Bucharest. Largely ignored by mainstream society, the children exist in their own sub-culture, huffing glue and petrol to fend off cold and hunger, begging and stealing for their daily survival. In this astonishing and emotionally searing documentary film, first-time director Edet Belzberg follows a gang of five children who live under a Bucharest subway station, led by the hardened and street-wise Cristina, who cuts her hair and disguises herself as a boy to fend off sexual predators. In scenes that shock even the most experienced child advocates, we are introduced to ten year-old Ana and her younger brother Marian, who must endure regular beatings by shop owners, witnessed by uncaring and unsympathetic local residents, and 12 year-old Mihai, sensitive and loving despite the abuse he routinely endures. Belzberg’s film won a Special Jury Prize at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival, and was an Academy Award Nominee for Best Documentary Feature that same year.

One reviewer described Children Underground as “a devastating portrait of human anguish and suffering more riveting and absorbing than anything ever before captured on screen”.

The film includes scenes of drug use and graphic violence, and is not recommended for children under the age of 14.