Documentary | 01 January 1986

This routine documentary on drug addiction among Belgian youth also looks at famous people who were addicted to one drug or another, such as Baudelaire and Freud, and the narrative skims through eras in history in which drug use was common. Among the periods and places mentioned are the English opium trade in China, drugs in the renaissance, and in ancient Rome. Many of the addicts in Belgium come from middle-class families or better and it is implied that they turned to drugs out of a sense of alienation or because they had nothing better to do. Drug users tended to start with casual substances but quickly turn to the more seriously addictive heroin or cocaine.