StreetwiseMovies like Streetwise
- Key Features:
- Documentary, Street life, Teenagers, Poverty, Survival, Prostitution, Theft, Social commentary, Realism, Urban environment, Youth culture, Social issues
- Tone:
- serious, gritty, restrained
- Target Audience:
- Socially conscious viewers, Documentary enthusiasts, Urban studies students, Realism appreciators
- Emotional Arc:
- Despair → Resignation
Streetwise

This documentary about teenagers living on the streets in Seattle began as a magazine article. The film follows nine teenagers who discuss how they live by panhandling, prostitution, and petty theft.
Streetwise
A day in the life of a group of teens as they travel around New York City skating, drinking, smoking and deflowering virgins.

An aimless adolescent joins several itinerant misfits who live on the fringe of society and welcome at-risk youths into their fold.

King is a young man, but he's already a veteran of life on the streets of Los Angeles. The de facto leader of a group of teenage runaways, King acts as a mentor to troubled kids such as gay hustler Little J and junkie Greg. When Heather, a beautiful girl from Chicago, starts hanging out with King and his crew, it changes the dynamic of the gang. However, it seems as though nothing will alter their dangerous lifestyle.

A routine trick propels a tall, dark, cynical hustler into a series of life-changing encounters in this drama. But this amicable and sexually efficient rent boy begins to look at himself differently when he finds himself lost in a maze-like apartment building. As he wanders through the building, he tricks with a variety of johns; sex is the commonality, but out of that commodity comes raw, unguarded emotions for all.

A harsh young man seduces a freeloading young woman and eventually takes advantage of her knack for hitchhiking to rob middle-class men.

Cagalera and Moloteco are two teenagers from San Gregorio Atlapulco who are desperate to get out and move up and away from oppressive circumstances. When they hear of an opportunity to buy a spot in the electrician’s union, which could transform their lives, they quickly devolve into the criminal, adult underworld of Mexico City in a bid to buy their freedom.

A cinematic portrait of the homeless population who live permanently in the underground tunnels of New York City.

The lives of five sex workers employed at a Japanese brothel while the nation is debating the passage of an anti-prostitution law.

Ken Park focuses on several teenagers and their tormented home lives. Shawn seems to be the most conventional. Tate is brimming with psychotic rage; Claude is habitually harassed by his brutish father and coddled, rather uncomfortably, by his enormously pregnant mother. Peaches looks after her devoutly religious father, but yearns for freedom. They're all rather tight, or so they claim.

Jasna, a beautiful teenager, leads a crude life in post-war Serbia. She goes on a spree of sex, drugs and partying until she finds love and tenderness in a harsh environment.

Introverted Girona student Nacho meets two delinquents from the city's Chinatown and gets caught up in a summer onslaught of burglaries and hold ups that will change his life.

The Los Angeles club scene is a place of booze-fueled decadence and debauchery. In a night full of possibilities, eight 20-somethings take to the clubs seeking good times, companionship and maybe a little sex. But in the harsh light of the morning after, their worlds are thrown into a spin of confusion when hungover Sara accuses hard-partying Mike of date rape. Loyalties are tested as each among them is forced to take sides.

The four friends Lukas, Julius, Gino and Sanchez are trying to survive the everyday life in Neukölln, Berlin between drugs, gangs, rap, violence and boredom. Until they are one day making a serious decision with serious consequences because of a dead certain plan.

15-year-old Rocks fears that she and her little brother Emmanuel will be taken into care and forced apart if anyone finds out that their mother has left them. Against all odds, and with the help of her loyal friends, she evades the authorities and navigates the most defining days of her young life.

When his hard-earned kicks get snatched by a local hood, fifteen-year old Brandon and his two best friends go on an ill-advised mission across the Bay Area to retrieve the stolen sneakers.

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.

The story of 4 lives slammed together in a shocking moment. Intercutting between a carjacking and the separate stories of the 4 kids, we watch as they hurtle toward a life-changing end.

Naples, Trajan's district. Initially it was intended for the inhabitants of the shantytowns on the seafront of Naples, who were homeless after the war. But it soon became a kind of ghetto. Alessandro and Pietro are two teenagers who film with an iPhone to tell their difficult neighborhood, their daily life, the friendship that binds them.

A successful gay male escort describes in a series of confessions his tangled romantic relationships with his two roommates and an older, enigmatic male client.

Léo, a 22-year-old homeless sex worker searches for genuine love on the streets of Strasbourg.

A group of teenagers suffer a terrible accident during a joy ride and get trapped at the bottom of a ravine.

Alejandro, a tough and ambitious Latino street orphan on the verge of adolescence, lives and works in an auto-body repair shop in a sprawling junkyard on the outskirts of Queens, New York. In this chaotic world of adults, young Alejandro struggles to make a better life for himself and his 16-year-old sister, Isamar.

Oppressed by her family setting, dead-end school prospects and the boys law in the neighborhood, Marieme starts a new life after meeting a group of three free-spirited girls. She changes her name, her dress code, and quits school to be accepted in the gang, hoping that this will be a way to freedom.

In Bangkok, Thailand, women punch a clock and wait for clients in a brightly lit glass box; in the red-light district of Faridpur, Bangladesh, a madam haggles over the price of a teenage girl; and in the border town of Reynosa, Mexico, crack-addicted women pray to a deity named Lady Death.

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.

Nina is an elderly woman who lives alone and feels distressed by the increasing violence in her neighborhood. Amidst conflicts with her neighbors, she decides to film the movement of drug traffickers from her window, hoping to assist the police. After months of recording suspicious activities, her initiative attracts the attention of a journalist, who approaches Nina and offers to support her in her mission.

As four friends prepare for life after high school, different challenges bring about turning points in each of their lives. The dramas unfold and resolve at their local rollerskating rink, Cascade.

A portrait of the myth of maternity around the story of Pepa and her daughter, who are evicted from their home and forced to wander for a place to live with no support network.

When her parents' financial problems threaten Ashley's dreams for college, the high school whiz kid takes matters into her own hands. She and her girlfriends turn their babysitting business into a wildly successful escort service for dads. But in this small suburban community, nothing stays secret for long.

A New York journalist lies when his fake story about a pimp describes a real pimp up for murder.

In 1990s Los Angeles, a 13-year-old spends his summer navigating between a troubled home life and a crew of new friends he meets at a skate shop.

A near-penniless drifter's journey to Alaska in search of work is interrupted when she loses her dog while attempting to shoplift food for it.

Instead of adhering to the norms of their South Central neighborhood, a group of skater boys opt to bus into Hollywood and Beverly Hills, where they attract local rich girls - and plenty of trouble with the police, jealous boyfriends, and nervous parents.

If you ever find yourself traveling down Interstate 49 through Missouri, try not to blink—you may miss Rich Hill, population 1,396. Rich Hill is easy to overlook, but its inhabitants are as woven into the fabric of America as those living in any small town in the country. This movie intimately chronicles the turbulent lives of three boys living in said Midwestern town and the fragile family bonds that sustain them.

In this true-crime documentary, a charismatic rebel in 1990s Seattle pulls off an unprecedented string of bank robberies straight out of the movies.

12-year-old Bailey lives with her single dad Bug and brother Hunter in a squat in North Kent. Bug doesn’t have much time for his kids, and Bailey, who is approaching puberty, seeks attention and adventure elsewhere.

To help her financially struggling mother, a teenage girl turns to escorting and meets a wealthy man who makes a proposal she can't refuse.

Zachary, 17 years old, gets out of jail. Rejected by his mother, he hangs out in the mean streets of Marseille. He falls in love with Shéhérazade, a young prostitute of whom he becomes the pimp without realizing it...

Poignant stories of homelessness on the West Coast of the US frame this cinematic portrait of a surging humanitarian crisis.

After a chaotic night of rioting in a marginal suburb of Paris, three young friends, Vinz, Hubert and Saïd, wander around unoccupied waiting for news about the state of health of a mutual friend who has been seriously injured when confronting the police.

After being sent to a detention centre, a teenage skinhead clashes with the social workers who want to conform him to the status quo.

Feeling confined by their small town and overbearing parents, Annie and Jules hatch a scheme of running away. The only issue is, they need the money to get there. Jules suggests the couple try webcam modeling. Although she’s nervous at first, Annie can’t argue when the money starts rolling in. But as the girls soon find out, consequences can blindside you. Sometimes violently.

A young street hustler attempts to escape the rigors and temptations of the ghetto in a quest for a better life.

Two teenagers, both newcomers to London, forge an unlikely friendship over the course of a hot summer. Tomo is a runaway from Nottingham; Marek lives in the district of Somers Town, between King's Cross and Euston stations, where his dad is working on a new rail link.

An aspiring teen thieves learn what it takes to be successful pickpockets on the streets of Bogotá

After serving six years for killing his schoolmate, a young man learns that someone is out for revenge.

Determined to have a normal family life once his mother gets out of prison, a Scottish teenager from a tough background sets out to raise the money for a home.

Fourteen-year-old Mackenzie is sent to live with her uncle in Juneau when her mother can’t care for her anymore. The living situation quickly takes a turn for the worse, and she runs away to rejoin her mother in Seattle. While on her dangerous journey of sleeping in cars and breaking into hotel rooms, she’s drawn to Rene, a lonesome backpacker looking for tranquility in the wilderness.

Gentle and broken, a homeless man fights others on video for money but soon finds comfort in an unlikely friend and the lost diary of a young girl.

In the poverty-stricken favelas of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s, two young men choose different paths. Rocket is a budding photographer who documents the increasing drug-related violence of his neighborhood, while José “Zé” Pequeno is an ambitious drug dealer diving into a dangerous life of crime.

A group of bored teenagers rebel against authority in the community of New Granada.

On a Tokyo dump’s shantytown edge, interwoven vignettes follow residents scraping by: a boy who “drives” an imaginary trolley, a homeless father and son designing a dream house, a young woman brutalized at home, drunks, schemers, and saints of small kindnesses. Kurosawa crafts a ragged mosaic of hardship, fantasy, and flickers of grace that keep people moving forward.

Four sisters work together to raise rent money after learning they have to move to another neighborhood in this coming-of-age drama based on the series.

This documentary follows three women — a fire chief, a judge, and a street missionary — as they battle West Virginia's devastating opioid epidemic.

A young woman, Janice, is living with her restrictive and conservative parents, who lead a dull working-class life and consider their daughter to be “misbehaving” whenever she’s trying to find her own way in life.

Molly Stewart, a teen at the top of her class who survives by working nights as a prostitute on Hollywood Blvd, finds her world beginning to fall apart when a depraved, necrophiliac serial killer begins targeting LA’s streetwalkers.

The story of a streetwise party girl who gets mixed up in a violent drug deal and finds a possible way out - by masquerading as a Catholic nun.

Salih is a mechanic and the son of a respected barber named Ali. A woman named Tina arrives at Cholera Street, where she takes up residence and works as a prostitute.

10-year-old Pixote endures torture, degradation, and corruption at a local youth detention center where two of its members are murdered by policemen who frame Lilica, a 17-year-old trans hustler. Pixote helps Lilica and three other boys escape and they start to make their living by a life of crime which only escalates to more violence and death.

Outside, the first sun rays break the dawn. Sixteen years old Catarina can't fall asleep. Inconsequently, in the big city adults are moved by desire... Catarina found she is HIV positive. She wants to drag everyone else along.

Tokyo schoolgirl Hiromi and her friends engage in a practice known as enjo kosai, or "compensated dating", where older men pay young girls for dates. Hiromi plunges deeper into this world to raise money for an expensive ring.

Julie finally gets an interview for a job where she can raise her children better only to run into a national transit strike.

After their mother ends up in jail, two sisters turn to train robbery in order to support their family.

In 1976, a lower-middle-class teenager struggles to cope living with her neurotic family of nomads on the outskirts of Beverly Hills.

Amalie is the girl who has everything, good looks, money, a boyfriend and a big talent of dancing. One day, her world falls apart and she moves from everything she knows. Then enter Mikael. He is dancing in the streets and Amalie joins him in dancing on the streets, dancing Battles.

An uncompromising look into urban life from the eyes of a voyeuristic photographer, a rebellious teenager, and a married couple teetering on the edge of adultery.

Promiscuous teenager Chiara gets herself and her equally debauched peers embroiled in a drug ring run by a dirty cop.

After two teenagers from abusive households befriend each other, their lives take a dark adventure into existentialism, despair, and human frailty.

On the outskirts of Brooklyn, Frankie, an aimless teenager, suffocates under the oppressive glare cast by his family and a toxic group of delinquent friends. Struggling with his own identity, Frankie begins to scour hookup sites for older men.

Aleksandra is a student from Krško, a small town in Slovenia. She has a plan to conquer the world. Working as a prostitute, her life is heading to where she wants it, but an accidental death has her wrestling with new feelings of fear, loneliness, confusion and responsibility

Thousands of activists arrive in Seattle, Washington in masses to protest the WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999 (World Trade Organization). Although it began as a peaceful protest with a goal of stopping the WTO talks, it escalated into a full-scale riot and eventually, a State of Emergency that pitted protesters against the Seattle Police Department and the National Guard.

Several ordinary high school students go through their daily routine as two others prepare for something more malevolent.

Single mother Diana struggles to provide for her child and pay for her college education. When she meets two dancers from a nearby gentlemen's club, Diana's convinced there's fast money to be made stripping.

Two HIV-positive young men — a semi-employed film critic and a hot hustler — tear off on a cross-country crime spree.

Coming of age story about two inner city youths, who are left to fend for themselves over the summer after their mothers are taken away by the authorities.

Jack is caught with the wife of his employer, a Vegas thug. The thug sends goons after Jack, who convinces his best friend, Pilot, to flee with him. Pilot insists that they head for Seattle, but doesn't tell Jack why. The goons learn from Pilot's drug source where the youths are headed, and they follow, hell bent on breaking Jack's feet. On the road, Jack and Pilot give a ride to Cassie, a distressed young woman. She and Jack hit it off. They pick up an aging stoner headed to Seattle for Kurt Cobain's memorial, and they help a circus sideshow family. Why is Pilot so set on Seattle, will the goons catch Jack, and is there any way the friends' competing needs can be resolved?

Brenda, vivacious leader of the "Satins", a fun-loving group of pretty high school girls, searches for deadly vengeance against the gang members who assaulted her deaf-mute sister.

Rich Bower is an up-and-coming star in the hip-hop world. Everyone wants to be around him, including Raven and her fellow upper-class white high school friends. The growing appeal of black culture among white teens fascinates documentary filmmaker Sam Donager, who sets out to chronicle it with her husband, Terry. But before Bower was a rapper, he was a gangster, and his criminal past comes back to haunt him and all those around him.

A first-ever look at the realities of the professional “amateur” porn world and the steady stream of 18-to-19-year old girls entering into it.

A slightly dystopian vision of LA, we follow three disaffected teenagers, Jessie, Calvin and Nicky, all victims of extreme childhoods, running supreme hedonistic riot as they try to work out a way in life.

When Danielle is banished to special education because of her misbehavior, she joins Clarke on a road trip to discover themselves.

Fifteen-year-old Mia is in a constant state of war with her family and the world around her. When she meets her party-girl mother’s charming new boyfriend Connor, she is amazed to find he returns her attention, and believes he might help her start to make sense of her life.

Shopping malls - today's place of creating desires. Best jewelry, clothes, shoes. Unaffordable by young girls, but they "work" to get themselves sponsors for new items.

A social worker assigned to the care of the daughter of a single mother intervenes when the dad returns from prison and lures them into a life of crime.

Malcom's done with his life. Only the noise of Crystal Meth gives him a reason to keep going - everything else it has long regardless. Equipped with a bag full of weapons and self-made bombs, he makes his way to the nearby mall to really stir things up. On his personal war campaign, he not only changes his life radically, but also the fate of other people who are in the wrong place at the same time: a teenager whose favorite pastime is smoking pot in his dreary existence, a housewife, where their best days have been left behind, a greedy businessman whose only desire is to increase his wealth and a depressed pervert.

An ex-con struggling to readjust to life in his small town forms an intense bond with his former high-school teacher.

Two young women find themselves struggling to survive in Paris, street-wise Nathalie, a stripper, and naïve Sandrine, a barmaid. Together, they discover that sex can be used to their advantage, and pleasure.

Under the leadership of their counselor, teenagers at a juvenile detention center gain self-esteem by playing football together. Based on a true story.

Rachel is a girl, adopted by an upper middle class family, who rebelled at 17 and left her family and studies at a traditional college in Sao Paulo to become a sexy call girl. Shortly after starting work, she decided to write a blog about her experiences. Since some clients thought she looked like a surfer she adopted the name "Surfistinha" which means little surfer girl.

A single mom in the 1970s raises her two daughters and becomes involved in illegal drug trade to make a better life.

The Pregnancy project tells the real story of Gaby Rodriguez, a seventeen-year-old who attended a Washington state high-school and made her senior school project the treatment of pregnant teenagers by pretending to be pregnant.

A story about 11 girls living in Paris. Each of them has its own problems: career, love life, children. Every girl has their complexes and virtues. They always look elegant, hiding their inner feelings. Will they reach all the goals and overcome all their difficulties?

An abandoned child steals to survive and has problems when he decides to steal from the priest who helps him.

Somaieh, the youngest daughter of an indigent family, is getting married and fear is overwhelming each and every member of the family regarding how to overcome their difficulties after she's gone.

Samson, a cheeky 15-year-old boy, and Delilah, live in an isolated Aboriginal community in the Central Australian desert. The two teenagers soon discover that life outside the community can be cruel. Lost, unwanted and alone they discover that life isn’t always fair, but love never judges.




