The story

»How does one tell the story as it was? … You have to consider the whole background of that time: what was Germany, how did we feel about our parents and what they had done? … The strongest influence for young Germans at this time was the desire - the need - to be different from our parent’s generation. We were struggling to find a new way, to escape the past and the burden of guilt we all carried.
Our philosophy then, because we were only little kids, was wearing black clothes and going around looking moody. Of course, we had a clue who Jean Paul Sartre was. We got inspired by all the French artists and writers, because that was the closest we could get. England was so far away, and America was out of the question. France was the nearest. So we got all the information from France, and we tried to dress like the French existentialists.«
— Astrid Kirchherr

Hamburg, 1960. Astrid Kirchherr has finished art school and now works as an assistant for her former teacher, photographer Reinhart Wolf. Her relationship with Klaus Voormann, a young graphic designer, is slowly fading. One night in October, after having another argument, Klaus leaves and goes out on his own. He comes back late at night, totally excited about what he has just discovered down in St Pauli, the redlight district of Hamburg: a young group from England playing Rock’n'Roll in a club called Kaiserkeller …
When Astrid eventually agrees to accompany him the following night, she doesn’t know her life is about to change forever.