Bjorn looks like a ghost - sepulchrally thin, grey face hidden by long white hair and beard. He drifts through his life in misery, completely emotionally shut down, chain smoking and living in poverty and self-imposed squalor. Is it a film about the dark side of fame? Or is it about the curse of great beauty? Well, the case is not made adequately. Yes, his screen test with Visconti was rather exploitative, but we learn that during the shoot of 'Death in Venice', his pushy 'stage mum' grandmother was always with him, and he had a female chaperone. The film makers follow him as he revisits Japan (did they pay for him? It's not revealed) where he had been mobbed and almost worshipped as the beautiful boy; and it seems that in retrospect those were the times, although weird and almost overwhelming, that he felt the most alive. The film then frustratingly draws a veil over his life after he left adolescence behind. We hear hints at hedonism and self-destructive addictions and broken relationships, and another hugely traumatic event in his late twenties. The only thing the viewer can be certain of is that Bjorn's early childhood is where his misery really stems from; the trauma of which he has never been able to come to terms with.