SYNOPSIS
Teenage. The concept of the ‘teenager’ was an American post World War II invention. Matt Wolf, one of Brooklyn’s favourite young filmmakers follows his acclaimed documentary Wild Combination: A Portrait of Arthur Russell with this fresh and audacious look at the wild energy and angst of adolescence. Based on Jon Savage’s book Teenage: The Creation of Youth and skillfully constructed from stunning black-and-white footage from the beginning of the 20th century up to the end of the 1940s, the film captures milestones in youth culture from some of the brightest and darkest moments of recent history. From the ban of child labour, the roaring twenties and the flappers, to the bright young things in London, Hitler Youth, and the fever of jitterbug dancing in the US, the teenagers in Wolf’s film find a thousand different ways to escape adult oppression and influence society, culture and politics.
