Shining Star

Kids is a 1995 American independent teen drama film directed by Larry Clark and written by Harmony Korine in their directorial and screenwriting debuts, respectively. It stars Leo Fitzpatrick, Justin Pierce and Chloë Sevigny in their film debuts. Fitzpatrick, Pierce, Sevigny, and other newcomers including Rosario Dawson portray a group of teenagers in New York City. They are characterized as libertines, who engage in sexual acts and recreational substance abuse, over the course of a single day. Ben Detrick of the New York Times has described the film as "Lord of the Flies with skateboards, nitrous oxide and hip-hop... There is no thunderous moral reckoning, only observational detachment." The MPAA initially assigned Kids an NC-17 rating, but distributor Miramax Films declined to release it with that classification and instead distributed the film unrated through its shell company Shining Excalibur Films to avoid the commercial restrictions associated with the NC-17 label. Critical response was mixed, and the film grossed $20.4 million on a $1.5 million budget. It is now considered a cult classic.