Oi! Warning

Seventeen-year-old Janusch runs away from home. He leaves his mother and girlfriend and goes to Dortmund to see his older friend Koma, who is a brewery worker, kick boxer, and skinhead. Janusch wants to be exactly like him and to kick as hard. Janusch's first victim is a punk who almost dies from the battering but is saved by his friends. When his studio burns down, Koma thinks that the punk's friends want revenge. But instead of retaliating Janusch falls in love with the punk and Koma witnesses their passionate lovemaking He is now seeking quite a different revenge ... ''Oi! Warning'' is sung by the group at the club where Koma takes Janusch to teach him to drink beer and mix with his pals. The film describes a fellowship that excludes women but involves extreme violence against people who are different. The important thing is to be a warrior that seeks perfection in his kicks and never shows compassion. Young Janusch is drawn to this world and is taken into the fellowship when he shaves his head and adapts Koma's attitude. The film is shot in black & white and has a straightforward narrative technique. The Reding brothers do not try to embellish or sentimentalise Koma's world. The film has formalised sequences depicting violence. At the end realism is broken and a sequence of symbolic narrative takes over. The film is then dominated by flames, a symbol for the purifying of the soul and we see Janusch in pieta position, holding his beloved in his arms.