Fourteen-year-old Nicole (Nicole Gläser) lives in a Berlin high-rise flat with her two younger sisters, Monique (Monique Gläser) and Jeanine (Jeanine Gläser), and her mother (Sandke), who works nights.

Hanging out with her friends at the local playground, the schoolgirl meets Christopher (Schöps), a boy her age from the same neighbourhood.

The two quickly develop an intimate relationship, but will Nicole's feelings of true love be reciprocated by her new boyfriend?

The film school graduation feature of young Austrian director Valeska Grisebach, "Be My Star" is a low-key, carefully-observed account of adolescent dating.

Doubtless the likes of Larry "Kids" Clark will be disappointed at the absence of any drug-taking, physical violence or graphic sex scenes between the pubescent characters in this hour-length film.

But Grisebach has gone on record saying she didn't want to make a statement about the 2000 generation in "Be My Star". Instead she examines how teen love affairs can simultaneously be strikingly intense and alarmingly fragile, liable to end with minimal warning.

Adults, and in particular fathers, are significantly absent from the children's lives here - Nicole's mum makes a fleeting appearance, as does a female employee at the bakery where the protagonist is doing some mundane work experience.

But the youngsters nevertheless imitate grown-up romantic rituals - hence the mock-wedding ceremony participated in by Monique, and the recital of an updated Prince Charming story.

Shot with a calm detachment, and intelligently using music to illustrate individuals' feelings, "Be My Star" is also aided by the unobtrusive performances of its non-professional cast.

In German with English subtitles.

"Be My Star" is showing at London's National Film Theatre - in a double bill with Jessica Hausner's "Flora" - from Friday 23rd August 2002.