Berlin CallingMovies like Berlin Calling
- Key Features:
- Electronic music, Drug abuse, Mental illness, DJ, Music industry, Psychiatric hospital, Touring, Relationship drama, Personal struggle, Addiction
- Tone:
- serious, gritty
- Target Audience:
- Music enthusiasts, Indie film viewers, Character-driven drama fans, Counter-culture
- Emotional Arc:
- Intoxication → Breakdown
Berlin Calling

A man tours clubs around the globe with his manager and girlfriend. On the eve of their largest album release he is admitted to a psychiatric clinic after overdosing at a gig.
Berlin Calling
A German student, Stefan, now finished with his studies, hitchhikes to Paris. There he meets a free-spirited American girl, Estelle, who he follows to Ibiza. The two begin a sad and dark path into heroin addiction.

A passionate holiday romance leads to an obsessive relationship when an Australian photojournalist wakes one morning in an abandoned Berlin apartment and is unable to leave.

This movie portrays the drug scene in Berlin in the 70s, following tape recordings of Christiane F. 14 years old Christiane lives with her mother and little sister in a typical multi-storey apartment building in Berlin. She's fascinated by the 'Sound', a new disco with most modern equipment. Although she's legally too young, she asks a friend to take her. There she meets Detlef, who's in a clique where everybody's on drugs. Step by step she gets drawn deeper into the scene.

A comedy following the tragic life of the legendary Frankie Wilde. The story takes us through Frankie's life from being one of the best DJs alive, through a subsequent battle with a hearing disorder, culminating in his mysterious disappearance from the scene.

A recovering drug addict is granted a day’s leave from rehab and returns to Oslo, where he reconnects with friends, faces the weight of his past, and struggles with uncertainty about his future. Over the course of one day, he drifts through encounters that reflect his longing for connection and his deep sense of alienation.

A troubled rock star descends into madness in the midst of his physical and social isolation from everyone.

Paul, a teenager in the underground scene of early-nineties Paris, forms a DJ collective with his friends and together they plunge into the nightlife of sex, drugs, and endless music.

In Munich 1955, German film star Veronika Voss becomes a drug addict at the mercy of corrupt Dr. Marianne Katz, who keeps her supplied with morphine. After meeting sports writer Robert Krohn, Veronika begins to dream of a return to stardom. As the couple's relationship escalates in intensity, Veronika begins seriously planning her return to the screen -- only to realize how debilitated she has become through her drug habit.

Lukas, a young schizophrenic man, has to deal with a new town, a new relationship, and the paranoia in his head.

Alex Linden is a psychiatrist living in Vienna who meets Milena Flaherty though a mutual friend. Though Alex is quite a bit older than Milena, he's attracted to her young, carefree spirit. Despite the fact that Milena is already married, their friendship quickly turns into a deeply passionate love affair that threatens to overtake them both. When Milena ends up in the hospital from an overdose, Alex is taken into custody by Inspector Netusil.

Today is Lara’s 60th birthday, which happens to fall on the same day as her pianist son’s career-defining concert. A failed pianist herself, Lara spends the time before his performance pacing about Berlin—boiling with jealousy, nerves, and pride—trying to get hold of her elusive son.

Inside the Blue Note nightclub one night in 1959 Paris, an aged, ailing jazzman coaxes an eloquent wail from his tenor sax. Outside, a young Parisian too broke to buy a glass of wine strains to hear those notes. Soon they will form a friendship that sparks a final burst of genius.

Barry is a drug-addled, abusive bastard who - after yet another bender - is abducted by aliens. Barry takes a backseat as an alien visitor assumes control of his body and takes it for a joyride through Cape Town. What follows is an onslaught of drugs, sex, and violence as our alien tourist enters the weird and wonderful world of humankind.

Nando and Erika, two young people in their twenties, meet several times without noticing. The story of the subculture of electronic music and rave parties and drugs like MDMA.

An intimate study of two women friends who come to each other because of troubles with everyday life and with men and thus try to enjoy a life based on their ideas.

The hero-worship that Simone has for a pop singer is built to a crescendo until she passes out when she finally sees him up-close in a crowd of fans. She is later shocked when he lets her know that he does not love her.

In October 1989, the part of the West Berlin borough of Kreuzberg called SO 36, had been largely shut off by the Wall from the rest of the city for 28 years. A lethargic sub-culture of students, artists, bohemians and barflys had flourished among crumbling buildings. Part of that microcosm is barkeeper Frank, semi-formally called 'Herr Lehmann' by friends and patrons. He hangs out drinking, sports utter disregard for anything beyond SO 36 and lazily pursues an affair with cook Katrin. His lifestyle is gradually disturbed, when his parents show up for a visit, things go awry with Katrin and his best friend Karl starts to act strange. Meanwhile, political turmoil mounts on the other side of the Wall.

A teenager stops off to see his dealer to test a new drug before heading off for a night of partying. On the way home, he picks up an injured woman, and the night takes a surreal turn.

A much abused loner achieves success, and even wins the heart of his gorgeous co-worker, after getting early morning mysterious phone calls from someone.

A self-destructive punk rocker struggles with sobriety while trying to recapture the creative inspiration that led her band to success.

Over the course of one night, a woman drives across LA with her heroin addict brother in search of a detox center, with his two-year-old daughter in tow.

A drug pusher grows increasingly desperate after a botched deal leaves him with a large debt to a ruthless drug lord.

A musician plagued by insomnia is pulled into an odyssey with a stranger who begins to unravel the very core of his existence.

Chronicles the early days of The Beatles in Hamburg, Germany. The film focuses primarily on the relationship between Stuart Sutcliffe, John Lennon, and Sutcliffe's girlfriend Astrid Kirchherr.

In need of creative inspiration, a professionally stagnant and hard-partying Los Angeles artist recklessly indulges in a series of drug binges. As the narcotics fly out of control, so does her newfound and inexplicable, yet unquenchable, craving for blood.

Fox, a former circus performer, wins the lottery of DM 500,000 and can now have the life and things that he has always wanted. He enters an abusive relationship with wealthy industrialist Eugen in an attempt to climb the social ladder. His desperation for love and affection soon spirals into tragedy.

A documentary on the life of Amy Winehouse, the immensely talented yet doomed songstress. We see her from her teen years, where she already showed her singing abilities, to her finding success and then her downward spiral into alcoholism and drugs.

In a desolate community full of drug-addled Marines and rumors of kidnapping, a wild-eyed stoner named Lou wakes up after a crazy night of partying with symptoms of a strange illness and recurring visions. As she struggles to get a grip on reality, the stories of conspiracy spread.

When lovelorn Michael arrives in Berlin to return a set of keys to his ex-girlfriend, Gabi, as an excuse to see her again, he finds her apartment empty save for a couple of plumbers making repairs to the central heating. Just as Michael learns from the plumber’s apprentice, Harper, that Gabi has popped out for a while but will return soon, the apprentice is attacked by his boss who has unexpectedly and inexplicably transformed into a raging madman. Together, Michael and Harper manage to bundle the crazed plumber out of the apartment and barricade themselves safely inside. Within minutes, they find themselves trapped in apartment block under siege from a horde of similarly insane people, apparently hungry for human flesh.

The drug-induced utopias of four Coney Island residents are shattered when their addictions run deep.

A young woman left her family for an unspecified reason. The husband determines to find out the truth and starts following his wife. At first, he suspects that a man is involved. But gradually, he finds out more and more strange behaviors and bizarre incidents that indicate something more than a possessed love affair.

A radio DJ in pursuit of an exclusive interview follows ABBA during their mega-successful tour of Australia.

Otis and Eddie have been best friends since childhood and live in Berlin on a day-to-day basis. No prospects, only the big dream of music. When one day a record label becomes aware of them, nothing stands in the way of living out this dream. But the record label likes to interfere and the friendship is put to the test.

Maik, a fourteen-year-old teenager, sets out on a road trip during summertime with Tschick, a new classmate, in a stolen car. The two share life changing experiences during the eventful journey.

After his wife leaves him, a disillusioned director dives into the drug scene, trying anything his friend suggests.

Two competitive friends, fueled by literary aspirations and youthful exuberance, endure the pangs of love, depression and burgeoning careers.

London is a drug laden adventure that centers on a party in a New York loft where a young man is trying to win back his ex-girlfriend.

Heather is a shy lady who works in a helpline call centre. When she receives a phone call from a mystery man, she has no idea that the encounter will change her life forever.

In 1980s East Germany, Barbara is a Berlin doctor banished to a country medical clinic for applying for an exit visa. Deeply unhappy with her reassignment and fearful of her co-workers as possible Stasi informants, Barbara stays aloof, especially from the good natured clinic head, Andre.

A posthumous look at the last days of Guenther's life as he, his best friend, and his sister let loose on a four-day binge of alcohol, drugs, and sex.

Unable to cope with a recent personal tragedy, LA's top celebrity shrink turns into a pothead with no concern for his appearance and a creeping sense of his inability to help his patients.

Whilst on their way to a concert four friends get sidetracked and stranded in a seemingly abandoned town and whilst looking for help find themselves stalked and terrorised by a gang of violent clown dressed psychopaths who will stop at nothing ensnaring them into their sinister blood thirsty games.

Richie Bravo, once upon a time a successful pop star, chases after his faded fame in wintry Rimini. Trapped between permanent intoxication and concerts for busloads of tourists, his world starts to collapse when his adult daughter breaks into his life.

Saxophone player Charlie ‘Bird’ Parker comes to New York in 1940 and is quickly noticed for his remarkable way of playing. He becomes a drug addict but his loving wife Chan tries to help him.

The life and struggles of a notorious rock musician seeping into a pit of loneliness whose everyday life involves friends and family seeking financial aid and favors, inspired by rock music legend Kurt Cobain and his final hours.

In 1923 Berlin, following the suicide of his brother, an American acrobat struggles to survive while facing unemployment, depression, alcoholism, and the social decay of Germany during the Weimar Republic.

As celebrated conductor Lydia Tár starts rehearsals for a career-defining symphony, the consequences of her past choices begin to echo in the present.

Rock-and-roll singer Mary Rose Foster's romantic relationships and mental health are continuously imperilled by the demands of life on the road.

Bruno Stroszek is released from prison and warned to stop drinking. He has few skills and fewer expectations: with a glockenspiel and an accordion, he ekes out a living as a street musician. He befriends Eva, a prostitute down on her luck and they join his neighbor, Scheitz, an elderly eccentric, when he leaves Germany to live in Wisconsin.

In 2015, thirty year old refugee Francis, the sole survivor of a boat that illegally crossed the Mediterranean, is drawn into Berlin's seedy underbelly.

The son of a wealthy businessman finds solace in drugs and alcohol when he breaks up with his childhood love.

In a pseudo-futuristic 1994, a square couple enter the corrupt world of the music industry, and subsequently a maze of drugs, sex, and temptation.

When German police viciously quell a protest against the shah of Iran, popular journalist Ulrike Meinhof rebels against her dishonest marriage, walks away from her children and joins radical anarchist Andreas Baader. Together with Baader's girlfriend, Gudrun Ensslin, they form the violent Red Faction Army, and together perpetrate a slew of terrorist attacks as a way of disrupting the fabric of what they see as an increasingly fascist state.

Lola receives a phone call from her boyfriend Manni. He lost 100,000 DM in a subway train that belongs to a very bad guy. She has 20 minutes to raise this amount and meet Manni. Otherwise, he will rob a store to get the money. Three different alternatives may happen depending on some minor event along Lola's run.

A gallerist risks her family and flourishing career when she enters into an affair with a talented painter and slowly loses control of her life.

A mute man with a violent past is forced to take on the teeming underworld of a near-future Berlin as he searches for his missing girlfriend.

From the youth directed novel of the same name by Greogor Tressnow comes a film by Detlev Buck that is a realistic portrait of life in the section of Berlin called Neukölln. It’s about power and weakness, delinquents and victims, and the difficulties a 15-year-old faces in a poor and criminal environment.

On her wedding night, a young woman conceives a child during an hallucinatory encounter. Several years later, as her friends and family begin to behave strangely, she pieces together clues that lead to one conclusion...her son is the Antichrist

A young Spanish woman who has newly moved to Berlin finds her flirtation with a local guy turn potentially deadly as their night out with his friends reveals a dangerous secret.

Benjamin, a rising star filmmaker, is on the brink of premiering his difficult second film No Self at the London Film Festival when Billie, his hard drinking publicist, introduces him to a mesmeric French musician called Noah.

A schizophrenic rock musician, is convinced that his parents were murdered by three men. Taking the support of a journalist, he sets out to find the culprits. Will he succeed in his mission, and in the process, what will he learn about his own roots?

A drunken, self-destructive woman called Betty wanders into a Parisian bar where she meets middle-aged alcoholic Laure. Laure decides to take care of Betty. Recovering in a hotel room, Betty begins to recount to Laure the story of her bourgeois life and her unhappy and unfaithful marriage.

A love story following two young people battling with their emotions and dreams, the pressures of career, family and not knowing what the future holds. Füsun is a brilliant student, destined for a successful career but can't help from falling for Baris, a musician who struggles with a psychological disorder. As the two grow closer they start to adopt each other's traits, but becoming increasingly dependent on one another proves damaging for their relationship.

A poet falls in love with an art student, who gravitates to his bohemian lifestyle — and his love of heroin. Hooked as much on one another as they are on the drug, their relationship alternates between states of oblivion, self-destruction, and despair.

Upon learning that his days are numbered, a man and an old friend return to an old house that connects them by a dark secret. Along with three women and a mysterious old man, the group journeys into a horrifying abyss of debauchery and moral mayhem, leading to a fatal turn of events, during which the darkest human depths are revealed.

In the 1970s, a British sound technician is brought to Italy to work on the sound effects for a gruesome horror film. His nightmarish task slowly takes over his psyche, driving him to confront his own past.

Over the course of three days Ross, a college dropout addicted to crystal-meth, encounters a variety of oddball folks - including a stripper named Nikki and her boyfriend, the local meth producer, The Cook - but all he really wants to do is hook up with his old girlfriend, Amy.

Helene, a pill-addicted anesthesiologist, is mourning the death of her boyfriend when, through a car accident she causes, she chances to meet the lethargic Gilles, a young man who lives for free at his mother's hotel. Gilles pursues Helene romantically, and she eventually softens up. Gilles, however, is also devoted to Bernard, a petty crook who revels in mugging gay men. All three struggle with relationships that seem to be going nowhere.

In 1930s Berlin, Dr. Jakob Fabian, who works by day in advertising for a cigarette company and by night wanders the streets of the city, falls in love with an actress. As her career begins to blossom, prospects for his future begin to wane.

Kings should be treated courteously! At least, that's what famous music critic Georg thinks. But he finds himself counting pennies when his chief editor suddenly fires him from the Viennese newspaper for which he has been writing for decades. While keeping his dismissal a secret from his psychotherapist wife Johanna, whose mind is occupied solely by getting pregnant, Georg begins to plot his revenge.

Michaela, an epileptic, enrolls in college to study education. She goes off her medication and soon begins hearing voices and seeing apparitions that tell her to avoid religious objects, although she is devoutly Roman Catholic. One priest scoffs at the idea that Michaela could be possessed by demons, but a younger pastor arranges an exorcism for the young woman.

The story of Joy Division’s lead singer Ian Curtis, from his schoolboy days in 1973 to his suicide on the eve of the band's first American tour in 1980.

Niko, a twenty-something college dropout, lives for the moment as he drifts through the streets of Berlin, curiously observing everyone around him and oblivious to his growing status as an outsider. Then on one fateful day, through a series of absurdly amusing encounters, everything changes.

The real life story of East German singer and writer Gerhard Gundermann and his struggles with music, life as a coal miner and his dealings with the secret police (STASI) of the GDR.

Mikael is doctor on night call. It’s a vocation. Between two patient-visits in slum areas, he cares for those whom no one else wants to see: the drug addicts, the homeless… He rubs shoulders with destitution. His life is in shambles. Especially when it comes to his pharmacist cousin who makes him write false prescriptions for Subutex. Overnight, he decides to get out of drug trafficking and rebuild his life. But there will be a heavy price to pay.

A lonely private investigator is contacted by a mysterious woman who pulls him into a mind game known as “telephone walking”. Fascinated by her voice, Aloys discovers an imaginary universe that allows him to break out of his isolation.

Stockholm, late 1970s. Within a stone’s throw of government buildings and juvenile homes lies the seductive world of sex clubs, discotheques and private residences. Call Girl tells the story of how young Iris is recruited from the bottom of society into a ruthless world where power can get you anything.

16-year old Steffi just graduated from high school and is very much looking forward to her class trip to Paris where she has promised her boyfriend Fabian the romantic night that she has kept him waiting for so long. Her lifelong plan to join the police forces is already set up, her adult life is right around the corner. At a routine health check-up, just before the trip to Paris, Steffi and her parents are faced with a shattering diagnosis ...

Vicky recalls her romances with her exes Hao Hao and Jack in the neon-lit clubs of Taipei.

This is the story of Isa, who grows up in a Hamburg suburb. It might be one of the world's richest cities but every beast has its belly and here, in the very underbelly, Chiko lives in a world where violence, staking and keeping a claim, and drug taking are the norm. Where down is not an option, Chiko is determined to rise to the top, whatever and whomever it costs.

Two families attempt a daredevil plan to escape the GDR with a homemade hot air balloon, but it crashes just before the border. The Stasi finds traces of this attempt to escape and immediately starts investigations, while the two families are forced to build a new escape balloon. With each passing day the Stasi is closer on their heels – a nerve-wracking race against time begins.

A love connection clicks for Lila when she moves back to Berlin and meets Christopher -- never realizing that she's fallen for a rock star who's signed a contract to remain single for life.

Late one evening Alex suddenly abandons his girlfriend, Simone, to pursue the beautiful Aimee. In his encounter with Aimee time and place dissolve for him and he becomes a stranger to Simone, to whom he cannot return.

When cops recruit a has-been DJ to bust a quirky criminal gang with ties to his rival, he spots a chance to mix his way back to the top with a banger.

Seventeen-year-old Carlos doesn't fit in anywhere, not in his family nor with the friends he has chosen in school. But everything changes when he is invited to a mythical nightclub where he discovers the underground LGBTQ nightlife scene: punk, sexual liberty and drugs.

A group of drug-influenced lumpen teenagers from the suburbs of the city descends into the center where they do not belong, where they are excluded. They adopted a brutal method to seize rights that were not granted to them. Unaware of what will happen to them, cheerful and well-to-do university students are helpless in the face of this gun-wielding mob that suddenly raids the bar where they are having fun.

A top surgeon is besotted with a beautiful woman who once rebuffed him. Unable to come to terms with life without her, he tries to convince her that they need each other. She has other ideas, but a horrific accident leaves her at his mercy.

Charting the rise and fall of three corrupt real estate agents who accumulate absurd wealth in no time but fall into a vortex of fraud, greed and drugs.

Benjamin, a young German computer whiz, is invited to join a subversive hacker group that wants to be noticed on the world's stage.

Berlin, the Prenzlauer Berg district. Daniel is a movie star accustomed to success. His loft apartment is stylish and so is his wife, and the nanny has the children under control. Everything is tip-top, bilingual and ready for him to jet off to an audition in London where a role in an American superhero film awaits the celebrated German-Spanish actor. Popping into the local bar on the corner, he finds Bruno sitting there. As transpires by the minute, Bruno has been waiting for this moment for a long time. And so this eternally overlooked man – one of reunification's losers and a victim of the gentrification of what was once East Berlin – takes his revenge. With Daniel as his target...

A Spanish orchestra conductor deals with the mysterious disappearance of his girlfriend.

Cecilie and Joachim are about to get married when a freak car accident leaves Joachim disabled, throwing their lives into a spin. The driver of the other car, Marie, and her family don’t get off lightly, either. Her husband Niels works in the hospital where he meets Cecilie and falls madly in love with her.

Paris doctor Catherine starts to think her husband, Bernard, is having an affair when she hears an unfamiliar woman's message on his voice mail. Hoping to learn more about his extramarital activities, Catherine heads to a strip club, where she hires call girl Nathalie to have a fling with Gerard. As the affair progresses, Nathalie gives Catherine regular status reports, and the relationship between the women evolves from business to personal.

An undercover MI6 agent is sent to Berlin during the Cold War to investigate the murder of a fellow agent and recover a missing list of double agents.

Peter von Kant, a successful, famous director, lives with his assistant Karl, whom he likes to mistreat and humiliate. Through the great actress Sidonie, he meets and falls in love with Amir, a handsome young man of modest means. He offers to share his apartment and help Amir break into the world of cinema. Several months later, Amir becomes a star. But as soon as he acquires fame, he breaks up with Peter, leaving him alone to face himself.




