In a week set to shape the country's immediate political future, cinema takes two large steps back in time. Following a heartbroken woman in her bid to prove that love is stronger than death, Fritz Lang's Der müde Tod/Destiny (1921) goes deep into the historical past to relate its three tales of tragic romance. By contrast, Mikhail Kaufman's In Spring (1929) is very much a film of its day, as it adopts the techniques of the `city symphony' to capture the changing scene in Kiev in a celebration of revival and renewal that is touchingly timely, given the recent atrocities in Manchester and London. Neither picture was a success on its initial release, but their reputations have burgeoned over the years, especially as Kaufman's Kino-Eye classic was long considered lost. So, credit to Eureka and Dochouse for reviving these silent masterpieces and for reaffirming the timeless message that life must and will go on.

Opening in `Some Time and Some Place', the action sees Death (Bernhard Goetzke) materialise from a puff of smoke on a windy country road. He hails a carriage containing a Loving Couple (Lil Dagover and Walter Janssen), who have playfully covered a goose belonging to their fellow passenger so that they can kiss without corrupting its morals. The old woman descends rather than share the coach with such a sinister stranger and the lovebirds huddle together as the driver moves away.

They arrive at a small town that time seems to have forgotten, where the dignitaries gather at the Golden Unicorn Inn for a nightcap. Close-ups introduce the greedily supping mayor (Hans Sternberg), the genial reverend (Carl Rückert), the gluttonous doctor (Wilhelm Diegelman), the fastidious notary (Max Adalbert) and the demure schoolteacher (Erich Pabst), who are discussing the stranger who had asked the gravedigger (Paul Rehkopf) for directions to the town and had inquired about the ownership of the land abutting the cemetery. On learning that the council planned to use the plot to extend the graveyard, the newcomer had produced several gold coins to secure a 99-year lease. But, having claimed he wanted the land to create a garden, he had erected a towering wall around the spot.

As the worthies discuss the fact that the barrier has no gates or doors, the sweethearts arrive in town and seek refreshment at the inn. They are followed by the outsider, who sits at their table as the landlady (Lydia Potechina) offers them a drink from bridal cup that is traditionally reserved for young couples. Death looks on as they fill the cup with wine and the woman sips from the base, while her fiancé takes a deep draught. However, she is so shocked to see the strangers pint pot turn into an hourglass that she breaks the cup and rushes into the kitchen in some distress.

She is mollified by some white kittens and a puppy. But, as she brings one of the cats to show to her fiancé, she is appalled to discover that he has disappeared, along with their mysterious travelling companion. The elders inform her that they left together and, acting on the advice of a beggar (Georg John), the woman runs around the town with a growing sense of despair. An owl hoots at the moon near the cemetery wall, while the nightwatchman (Max Pfeiffer) announces 10pm and warns the townsfolk against over-indulging in wine and schnapps or they will wind up in the Devil's realm. As they stagger home, the apothecary (Karl Platen) goes in search of herbs like touch-me-not balsam, Solomon's seal, wolfberry and centaury that acquire a special power from the full moon. While he works, however, the woman sees a column of ghosts walking towards her and she faints when she sees her beloved pass through the wall.

Finding the distressed damsel, the apothecary takes her back to the pharmacy, where he learned his trade at his father's knee. While he potters round brewing her a nourishing tea, the woman reads a quotation from the Song of Solomon about love being stronger than death. This gives her an idea and she pours herself a libation from one of the bottles and finds herself climbing a staircase inside an arched opening in Death's wall. He greets her and asks why she has entered his kingdom, as she still has many years to live. But she insists on sharing her lover's fate and Death takes her to a vaulted chamber filled with long, slender candles at different stages of burning. He informs her that each one represents a life and that it flickers only as long as God wills. She asks about her man, but Death assures her that his time had come and that he has not stolen him away from her.

Cupping a flame in his hand that turns into an infant who is mourned by its mother, Death laments being cursed with witnessing humanity's suffering and being detested for merely obeying God. Thus, when the woman begs for an opportunity to prove that love conquers all, Death affords her three chances to touch his heart and promises that, if she can stop one of the expiring candles from going out, he will reward her with her lover's soul.

`The Story of the First Light' takes place in the City of the Faithful in the month of Ramadan. As the Muezzin calls the people to prayer, a Frankish non-believer (Janssen) catches the eye of Princess Zobeide (Dagover), the sister of the Caliph (Eduard von Winterstein). He protests that he has not seen her in days and she chides him for raising such matters in the mosque. But their conversation is overheard by a Dervish (Rudolph Klein-Rogge) who raises the alarm that an infidel has desecrated the sanctuary. Zobeide rushes forward to urge her co-religionists not to shed blood in a holy place and her intervention allows the Frank to escape through the cloisters and up a staircase to the roof. Managing to held back the chasing horde by holding down a trapdoor, the Frank jumps into a pool and the Caliph's men report that the interloper is missing. Zobeide promises her brother that she only had the integrity of the mosque in mind when she saved the Frank from slaughter. But she sends her maid Ayesha (Erika Unruh) to find her lover and tell him to come under cover of darkness and use the secret way into the palace so that she can protect him. However, El Mot the gardener (Goetzke) follows Ayesha to the Frank's hideout and, when he climbs a rope into Zobeide's quarters, the guards are waiting for him. He is captured after a frantic pursuit through the magnificent palace and taken to the garden to be buried up to his neck. The Caliph takes his sister on to the roof and idly smokes a hookah, as she looks down to see the commotion in the garden. She rushes downstairs to cradle her dying lover's head. But El Mot transforms into Death and the first of the candles is extinguished.

The scene shifts to High Renaissance Venice for `The Story of the Second Light', as carnival revellers scamper over a bridge arching over the Grand Canal. Aloof from the festivities, Monna Fiametta (Dagover) tosses a rose to Gianfrancesco (Janssen), who is waiting beneath her balcony. Unfortunately, the gesture is witnessed by her scowling betrothed, Girolamo (Klein-Rogge), who reminds Fiametta that he is the finest swordsman in the Council of Fourteen before taunting her with the hope that she will one day throw him a flower after her foolish fancy has been buried following a heated carnival duel.

Left alone, Fiametta entrusts messenger (Lothar Mütel) with two missives and urges him to inform Girolamo that she sends her note with her best smile. She summons the Moor (Louis Brody) from a cockfight and presents him with a poison-tipped blade to use on an unwelcome guest she is expecting that night. However, Girolamo's thugs kill the messenger and steal the parchment urging Gianfrancesco to flee and stay in hiding until Fiametta has disposed of his rival. Seizing the chance for treachery, Girolamo sends one of his retinue to deliver the invitation he had received from Fiametta, along with a ring.

Naturally, Gianfrancesco is delighted and comes to the palace wearing a carnival mask that hides his true identity. As he enters, the masked Giametta confronts him with a rapier and they parry and thrust until Gianfrancesco backs up against the arras where the Moor is hiding and is fatally stabbed in the back. As his mask falls off, Fiametta realises her mistake and sobs over her lover, as the Moor changes into Death and the second candle burns out.

At the start of `The Story of the Third Light', magician A Hi (Paul Biensteldt) receives a long scroll from the Emperor of China, Djin Schuean Wang (Karl Huszar), asking him to brighten up his birthday celebrations with some astonishing new tricks. In a codicile, the Emperor warns A Hi that any failure to amuse will result in his beheading. Eager to duck the invitation, A Hi asks assistants Tiao Tsien (Dagover) and Liang (Janssen) to desist from kissing long enough to fetch his jade Sunday wand. He uses this to give the missive a serpentine form and casts it on to the air before summoning a magic carpet to take to the skies with his companions.

Their jolly mood is not shared by Wang, who sits grumpily twiddling his elongated fingernails in his palace under the simmering gaze of the imperial archer (Goetzke). Messengers inform him that there is no sign on road or river of A Hi. But Wang spots the carpet flying over head and orders A Hi to land. Aided by Tiao, he produces a miniature army from an empty box. But, when Tiao bows low to offer the gift to the Emperor, he decides that he would rather have her as his present. A Hi produces a fine white horse from a wood carving, but Wang refuses to let Tiao leave. Indeed, when Liang tries to snatch her away, the Emperor orders the executioner (Paul Neumann) to behead him the following morning.

Distressed by the news that Wang has ordered A Hi to make her succumb to his charms, Tiao snaps the magician's wand in half and turns him into a cactus. Realising she has power, she casts a porcine spell on the guards watching over her and then transforms Liang's prison into an elephant so that they can escape. Wang is furious and sends his army in pursuit. But Tiao uses the wand (which gets smaller after each incantation) to create fire sprites that slow down the mounted troops in the smoke-filled forest. However, Wang orders the archer to follow on the magic horse and he gallops through the air to trap the lovers. In a last desperate bid, Tiao turns Liang into a tiger and herself into a multi-armed statue. But the archer kills Liang with one arrow and, while he turns back into his human form, Tiao is left as a statue, with a single tear running down her marble cheek.

As the last candle is doused, the woman falls at Death's knees and implores him to let her paramour live. Taking pity on her, he grants her an hour to find a soul who would be willing to swap places with her lover. Suddenly finding herself back in the pharmacy, as the apothecary knocks the poison out of her hands, the woman asks the old man if he would sacrifice himself for her fiancé. But he drives her from the premises vowing not to lose a day, an hour of a breath to help her. The beggar repeats the same words and, so, she ventures to the hospital to see if one of the sick would be willing to help her. But, even the old ladies who proclaim to crave death refuse to shorten their span and the woman is about to leave when a fire breaks out and quickly spreads through the wards.

The townsfolk for a chain to ferry buckets of water from the fountain, as the patients are led to safety. A new mother (Louisa Lehnert) becomes hysterical when she realises that her baby has been left behind and the woman dashes inside to give the child to Death. However, as he reaches out his arms, she has a change of heart and lowers the newborn in a curtain to the waiting crowd and Death is so moved by her willingness to lose her own life that he takes her to her fiancé and leads their reunited spirits through the wall to an ambiguously better place as midnight strikes.

Co-scripted by Thea von Harbou and subtitled `A German Folk Story in Six Verses', this was the feature that established Fritz Lang among Weimar Germany's leading screen artists and reinforced the vogue for Expressionist melodrama that had been started by Robert Wiene's The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (1920), whose ending Lang had had a hand in redrafting. The influence of German folklore is readily evident, with the idea of life being a candle being borrowed from the Grimm fable, `Godfather Death'. Lang and Von Harbou also seem to have been influenced in their portmanteau structuring by DW Griffith's Intolerance (1916) and Carl Theodore Dreyer's Leaves From Satan's Book (1920), But it wasn't the light stories that inspired Luis Buñuel to become a film-maker and there is something more intriguing and unsettling about the wraparound narrative. In many ways, it echoes Abel Gance's J'Accuse (1919) in having a procession of departed souls, as most contemporary viewers would still equate loss of life with the recently ended war. Indeed, this could almost be seen as a consolatory parable for those mourning loved ones who perished in the service of the toppled Kaiser. But, by opting for period settings, Lang avoids social commentary and seeks to show in tribute to his much-missed mother how love has remained a constant through the ages.

Budgetary restrictions mean that this Decla-Bioscop picture is rather old-fashioned in technical terms, with the dissolves and superimpositions being no more sophisticated than those created by Georges Méliès a decade earlier. Moreover, Lang keeps the camera variously operated by Fritz Arno Wagner, Erich Nitzschmann and Hermann Saalfrank relatively still. But he makes intelligent use of close-ups, as well as tints and gradations of light and shade to bring a little atmosphere to the studio sets designed by the Caligari trio of Walter Röhrig (the bookend sequences) Hermann Warm (the Arabian Nights and Venetian segments) and Robert Herlth (the Chinese episode). Furthermore, he draws fine performances out of Lil Dagover and Bernard Goetzke, who is perfectly cast as the `Weary Death' of the German title, who takes no pleasure in his onerous duty.

Despite the worthy attempt to introduce some spectacle with the climactic conflagration, this is more an ambitious than an accomplished film and it's not entirely surprising that it was largely ignored by critics and audiences on its initial release and butchered by the American distributor that retitled it Behind the Wall. Yet, as Lang's reputation grew, it was reappraised and left its mark on Victor Sjöström's The Phantom Carriage (1921), Paul Leni's Waxworks, Raoul Walsh's The Thief of Bagdad (both 1924), FW Murnau's Faust (1926) and Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal (1957). Now, nearly a century later, it still looks magnificent and leaves one hoping that other landmarks of this vintage can be revived to ensure that the cineastes of tomorrow get to appreciate silent cinema on the big screen.

Having fallen out with his brother Denis (aka Dziga Vertov) during the editing of Man With a Movie Camera (1929), cinematographer Mikhail Kaufman decided to make his own experimental film and rather stumbled on the subject of In Spring. Seeking to capture a process of transformation that had its own visual poetry, as well as the same kind of political subtext that had sustained the Kino Glaz newsreels he had produced with his older brother, Kaufman anticipated the kind of `city pastorale' that Dutch documentarist Joris Ivens would achieve during the same year with Rain. However, Kaufman was also keen to demonstrate his own technological prowess, as he explored ways to modify and mechanise the camera in order to get shots that no one else would have contemplated, let alone attempted.

Opening with shots of clouds scudding across a winter sky, Kaufman conveys the harshness of the Ukrainian winter by showing people working hard to clear streets and blow holes in frozen waterways. Horses stand impassively as wagons are loaded up with snow, while soldiers help old ladies struggling to cope with the conditions. A snowman looks on. But, as the thaw begins, he sheds charcoal tears down his white cheeks before his head topples on to the ground.

Ships plough through choppy seas, while the shadow of an aeroplane glides over the onion domes of a church in the snowy city below. Trickles of water in the gutters become cascades and a piece of paper is buffeted by the speeding flow. Carts begin to pick their way through the standing water on rutted roads, while the reflection of a passing tram is seen upside down in a puddle. A workman fixing the telegraph wire is similarly shown, along with other vehicles negotiating the slippery surfaces. Horses get stuck in thick mud in both the town and the country, with shovels being required to dig out sinking wheels. Trains fare better, as they trundle along on their tracks. But cars are also getting back up to speed, as a remarkable wheel-level shot demonstrates on a Kiev road.

Down by the river, boatmen give their craft a lick of paint for the new season, while a woman does her laundry nearby. The last of the thick ice is beginning to break up and sends spurts of water into the air, as the floes gather momentum on the tide. However, the melting snow also causes river levels to rise and, while boats chug along nicely, many people are forced to paddle their way along their streets in small boats and anything else that floats. Dogs and babies appear fascinated by the swell, as do the geese bobbing along in their element. But the householders whose properties have been submerged will be less beguiled and Kaufman cross-cuts between two couples inspecting the locale while out for a stroll.

As the sun starts to twinkle on the water and head ripples shimmer up walls, housewives open their shutters, shake out their bedding and wash their windows. Children gather on balconies and see tenement neighbours rushing into the courtyard to play football and croquet. A young girl laughs at a dog worrying a ball, while a pair of puppies snuffle around under the disdainful gaze of a white cat. A group of Young Pioneers cast their shadows in a neat line across the pavement before Kaufman cuts between smiling close-ups. But he is soon hurrying after mothers pushing prams and children bowling along on bicycles. One boy has his picture taken in a mock-up car, while shadows scurry hither and thither about their business in the city centre.

While the grown-ups treat themselves to their favourite tipple in a bar, the kids enjoy an ice cream from a cart in the park. But it's not all play, as fruit trees have to be primed and the damage the floods caused to the railway sleepers has to be repaired. Trucks trundle along factory tracks, as machines whirr and bricks are stacked for delivery to one of the many building sites across the city. Pulley systems haul materials to the upper storeys and workmen teeter out on to high ledges to hammer nails or lay bricks. This feverish activity suggests a country undergoing reconstruction, with everyone doing their bit for the common good.

In true Constructivist style, Kaufman lingers on cogs clacking and wheels spinning as production lines churn out the vital components needed to turn the Soviet Union into an industrial powerhouse. Newspaper headlines urging unity to meet targets are juxtaposed with close-ups of concentrating faces, as men work beside women in the factories. But there is plenty of poetry amidst the toil, as pistons pump, machine tools drill and grind and metal shavings coil on lathes. The end product appears to be tractors, which are shown lining up on a collective farm. But the restless lens alights on the shunting wheels of a steam locomotive and Kaufman fixes his camera to the underside of a carriage to present a unique perspective on the engines transporting vital goods across the vast nation.

Out in the wilds, buds begin to appear on the trees. Birds build their nests and snails canoodle stickily, as lovers and friends stroll in the sunshine alongside mothers pushing prams. Flowers start to bloom in time-lapse sequences that reinforce the overriding theme of revival and replenishment. Bees and butterflies flit between plants, as ants, beetles and spiders dart around their roots. Smiling young faces look up at the nesting birds, while a tortoise plods across the screen between shots of pigs and geese rootling around a farmyard and zoo animals peering through their cage bars as small visitors with their faces pressed against the mesh fences in silent wonder. Lions, leopards, polar bears and camels look frustrated in their tiny enclosures, while children run around and play and a baby snoozes in its mother's arms.

Flowers bob in the breeze, as Kaufman heads out into the countryside once more. He films branches rustling and wheat fields rippling before following huge bags of grain into a mill to be turned into flour. Eager youths make banners for a celebration in the city, while an amusing shift of perspective makes it look as though someone is dusting the domes of St Sophia's Cathedral. Bottles pause to be filled in a distillery, while stop-motion animation is used to show a table being laid out for a feast. An Orthodox procession is cross-cut with a secular march, as priests bless the crops and people pray for a bountiful reward for their hard work. A top shot looks down on the parade through the city streets before Kaufman shows his own hand cranking the camera recording people picnicking on the grass. Everyone eats and drinks their fill in cheerful close-ups, as the puddings disappear in stop-motion and a woman with glowing cheeks drains her glass before giggling.

Cyclists take to the main square for a riding display, while rows of young women strike gymnastic poses. A large crowd gathers for a football match, with the camera getting close to the action thanks to repeated shots of the ball bouncing towards the lens. Women play netball and volleyball, while a man does some trick cycling. Motorbikes speed round a track, while gymnasts twirl around high bars and a pole vaulter sails over the bar. A diver plunges into the water from, as excited faces look on from the crowd at more bicycle stunts. One rider plays the accordion and people start dancing as he cycles backwards around them. A plane loops the loop before the sun sets to end a snapshot of a society coming to terms with its new identity, duties and freedoms under a revolutionary regime.

Avant-garde agit-prop dominated Soviet cinema in the silent era, but the emphasis is as much on the human as the political in this exhilarating overview, which was long thought to be lost until a copy was uncovered in an Amsterdam archive in 2005. Dispensing with intertitles, Kaufman relies solely on the juxtaposition of images to express his ideas about Communism and the response of ordinary people to the challenges set by the Kremlin. The footage is arranged into five sections - which were labelled `At the Turn', `Spring Vexation', `Life', `National Holidays' and `Spring is Coming' in Kaufman's writings - but Kaufman gathered images with no predetermined plan other than reflecting the changing face of the rural and urban landscapes as the seasons changed.

Having symbolised the overthrow of winter's tyranny by beheading a snowman, Kaufman suggests that there is plenty to do after years of neglect by showing the poor conditions of the roads and the railway network. He also implies through the flood footage that there will be suffering along the way to a brighter tomorrow. But, once the frosts have finally thawed, the dominant mood is optimism, as people work and enjoy the benefits of their labour. Moreover, Kaufman shifts his focus away from the old to the youth whose energy and enthusiasm will bring about the much-needed socio-economic transformation. Alexander Deryabin may have been overstating his case in Three Cinematographers (1930) when he declared that `Kaufman's snail is as beautiful as Greta Garbo.' But this is a work of vitality and joy that wears its technical brilliance as lightly as its ideological message.

Having forged a reputation with her prize-winning shorts, Strap on Olympia (1995), Pentuphouse (1998), Flower Girl (2000) and Joy (2000), Australian director Cate Shortland made a positive impression with her first features, Somersault (2004) and Lore (2012), which respectively focused on the sexual and political awakening of young girls in rural New South Wales and Nazi Germany. She further explores the dilemmas facing independent women in Berlin Syndrome, which has been adapted from an acclaimed Melanie Joosten novel by sophomore screenwriter Shaun Grant, who made such an impressive debut with his Justin Kurzel's The Snowtown Murders (2011). Despite its Stockholm Syndrome theme and several incidents of excruciating suspense, this is closer in tone to such measured studies of abduction as Michel Franco's Daniel & Ana (2009), Markus Schleinzer's Michael (2011), Jennifer Lynch's Chained (2012) and Lenny Abrahamson's Room (2015) than more generic detention and torture offerings.

Arriving in Berlin from Brisbane to have a life experience, twentysomething photographer Tessa Palmer hooks up with some English-speaking Germans in a backstreet bar. She winds up smoking dope on the roof of the townhouse where she is staying and takes pictures of the sun coming up over the city. Keen to do a book on East German architecture, Palmer buys some old slides from an antique shop and leafs through a book on Gustav Klimt before bumping into English teacher Max Riemelt at a pedestrian crossing. He offers her a strawberry and takes her for a walk to the allotments where his father, Matthias Habich, has a plot. He asks if anyone knows where she is when she lets a call from her mother go to voicemail. But he turns down an invitation for a nightcap, as he has a prior engagement.

Charmed by his good looks and mistranslations, Palmer quickly develops a crush on Riemelt and lies in bed studying his picture on her camera. She had planned to move on to Dresden, but decides to return to the neighbourhood where she had run into Riemelt and is delighted to find him in the bookshop skimming through the same volume on Klimt. Their fingers touch on the portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer, as Palmer comments (with grim irony) that the subject hid her deformed hand during the sitting. They go for a drink and he looks through the photos on her camera and dismisses her notion that East Germans were plucky people. He also surprises her when he grabs her throat, as he searches for the right word to describe how choked they were by the Communist regime.

As she has moved out of her temporary accommodation, Palmer accepts the offer of a bed for the night. She lets her fingers run over the peeling paint in the corridor of his building in a rundown part of town and soon finds his hands all over her body. Allowing him to peel off her t-shirt, she falls back on the bed and gasps when he removes her underwear. As they chat in post-coital whispers, Riemelt wishes she didn't have to leave. But, even though she is flattered by his compliments, she regrets not being able to get to know him better, as she has so much to see in such a short space of time.

The next day, Riemelt teaches his class James Baldwin's 1956 novel, Giovanni's Room, while Palmer discovers she has been locked in. She mooches around the apartment all day and teases Riemelt when he gets home about trying to take her prisoner. He insists he forgot to leave her a key and they make love in the shower before going clubbing. However, when Riemelt wakes the following morning, she discovers that the latch key doesn't fit the lock and that Riemelt has removed the SIM card from her phone. She also realises that he has removed the wedding ring necklace that her mother gave her and she becomes even more concerned when she finds some Polaroids hidden in a book in the kitchen. Yet, when she tries to smash the window with a chair, she finds that Riemelt has fitted reinforced glass and that she is trapped.

Failing to push past him when he returns home, Palmer tries to reason with Riemelt and apologises for saying anything during sex that might have given him the wrong impression. But he merely asks her if she likes fresh pesto and reminds her that no one can hear her no matter what noise she makes. He leaves her bound to the bed the following day, as he drops into the college where his father is lecturing. Riemelt resents Habich informing his students that his son has no idea about the realities of life in the former GDR and they continue bickering over supper, when Riemelt mentions that he has a new Australian girlfriend and Habich asks him what happened to the Canadian he had been seeing.

Back home, Riemelt unties Palmer and gives her space to shower. But she finds a long strand of blonde hair and realises she is not the first to enjoy Riemelt's hospitality. He tells her that he texted her mother to say she was okay and proceeds to take more Polaroids of her with her wrists and ankles tied. However, Palmer persuades him to let her loose the next morning, as she can't escape and wants to do more than watch cartoons on television. But, as soon as Riemelt leaves, Palmer begins searching through cupboards for something to use as a weapon and is surprised to find a screwdriver under the sofa. She bides her time when Riemelt returns (feeling tense after a staffroom showdown with Lucie Aron for using his mug) comes home and gets him interested in the jigsaw he bought her. But, then, she slams the tool through his hand and grabs the keys while he struggles to free himself. Palmer hurtles down the stairs and across the courtyard, only to find that the gate is locked and she is knocked unconscious with a broken hand and carried back to the flat when the bleeding Riemelt catches up with her.

Binding his wound, Riemelt carries on as normal. Habich is suspicious when he claims a chisel slipped while he was doing some DIY and rips off the plaster because the wound is getting infected. He asks if Riemelt would like to see his mother, but he insists he wants nothing to do with her because she defected to the West and abandoned them. Palmer notices his tetchy mood and puts on an old LP to amuse herself, while Riemelt takes another photograph and locks himself in his room.

At school, Riemelt has trouble keeping his eyes of gymnast Emma Bading, while coaching the basketball team. But he is horrified when she comes to the apartment and knocks on the door when he is cutting Palmer's hair in the shower. She peeps past him and sees the stranger in her towel, but still asks Riemelt why he was ogling her in the gym. He accuses her of having been flaunting herself and threatens to report her if she does it again. Intrigued, Palmer asks about Bading, but knows not to push her luck too far as she has been trying to pick the front door with a paperclip, which had snapped in his bedroom lock.

Christmas comes and Riemelt goes to stay with Habich and his pet dog. Lotte. On the first night he is away, the power shorts and Palmer is left in darkness. But she can still cook with gas and looks out on the snow covering the courtyard. She is left longer than she expected, however, because Habich dies during the night and Riemelt is reluctant to let him go. As he trims his toenails, Palmer paints hers and, as Riemelt wanders into the cellar and takes out his frustrations on a punching bag, Palmer snoops around the apartment and finds a novelty floaty pen from Calgary. Finally, however, Riemelt calls for an ambulance and he returns home feeling so low that he clings to Palmer, who had convinced herself he was never coming back. They grind together in desperation on the living-room floor and Palmer runs her fingers through her sobbing captor's hair, as she holds him.

Palmer wears one of her new dresses for Christmas day and is grateful for the novels he buys her. She asks if he ever thinks about the Canadian girl, but Riemelt denies that there has ever been anyone else in his life. He tells Palmer to close her eyes and presents her with Habich's dog and she cradles the creature after it licks her face. The following day, he takes Palmer for a walk in the woods and she enjoys the sensation of the snow on her fingertips, while he lingers with an axe. But a small boy walking nearby with his mother and brother hurts his leg and Riemelt is furious when Palmer tries to urge the sibling to call the cops. As he can't speak English, however, the boy becomes frightened and pulls away from her.

Returning to the car, Riemelt asks Palmer how she would mark their relationship out of 10 and, when she gives them a seven, he punishes her by forcing her into the boot for the drive home. He also lets Lotte run away when he takes her for a walk and Palmer has become so inured to his cruelty that she merely shrugs. Riemelt leaves her alone on New Year's Eve to go to friend Christoph Franken's party, but he is asked to leave when he accuses hostess Elmira Bahrami of being a shameless flirt.

In his absence, Palmer breaks into his room and finds two photo albums, one of which is filled with the Polaroids that Riemelt has taken of her, while the other seems to contain pictures of her dead predecessor. Pausing to watch the fireworks at midnight, Riemelt tries to chat up a lone tourist, only for her friend to call her away. While he drives home, Palmer spots a light in another window across the courtyard and frantically tries to signal through the window. However, just as the squatter reaches the apartment door, Riemelt caves in his skull with a tyre iron and he blames Palmer for the stranger's death, as he wraps his body in plastic sheeting and burns it in a dumpster.

A short while later, Riemelt sees a newspaper article about Palmer being missing. He orders her to pack her belongings because he needs to fumigate the apartment. But she spots that he is marking Bading's homework and burns her hand on the gas stove to create a distraction in order to slip an incriminating Polaroid between the pages of the exercise book. Leaving for school, the next day, Riemelt switches off the water supply to the flat. He returns the homework without noticing that Bading has found the snapshot and gives her permission to go to the bathroom without a second thought. She drops the picture, which is handed round the class before Riemelt confiscates it and dashes to his car to try and stop Bading from helping Palmer escape.

Held up in traffic, he abandons his car and sprints through the streets. He finds Bading's bicycle leaning up against the wall and grabs the crowbar to confront them. The door is open, but there is no sign of either Palmer or Bading until Riemelt hears the latter calling to him from the next landing. He smashes in the door of the upstairs flat that seems to have been empty for a long time. Palmer calls to him again and he creeps inside the apartment, only for Palmer to lock him inside and free Bading from her hiding place inside a wall panel. Realising he has been outfoxed, Riemelt sits in his reclining chair, while Palmer gazes out of a taxi window at the Brandenburg Gate and the Fernsehturm as she crosses into the old West Berlin and savours her liberty.

Played with admirable restraint by Palmer and Riemelt, this unsettling story depends heavily on the exceptional craft contributions of cinematographer Germain McMickling, production designer Melinda Doring and editor Jack Hutchings. A little more background on Palmer might not have gone amiss, but Shortland and Grant leak details of Riemelt's past through his visits to Habich and the second photo album. Yet they never provide entirely convincing reasons for his warped behaviour and why he seems not to notice (or care) that Palmer has breached his inner sanctum. It also seems odd that Aron, Bading and Bahrami should all find him peculiar without mentioning their misgivings to anyone else. Most damningly, Shortland struggles to convey the impression that Palmer harbours any Stockholm Syndrome feelings for Riemelt after Habich's demise, as she seems to remain pretty intent on escaping even after sleeping with him a second time after his prolonged absence. Such quibbles aside, however, this makes for disconcerting viewing, as Shortland exploits the proximity of the pair and their contrasts in body language, while McMickling's camera creeps around in the shadows to Bryony Marks's onerous electronic score. At times, Palmer and Riemelt recall Janet Leigh and Anthony Perkins as they chat over sandwiches in the Bates Motel office in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960). But the wildly melodramatic denouement is not handled with the same degree of finesse, as Grant and Shortland seem to lose their nerve after teasing out the increasingly far-fetched events for almost two hours and they rather lurch towards the gauchely symbolic flight to freedom with as much a sense of relief that their ordeal is over as Palmer.

Actress Nicole Garcia has a remarkable record behind the camera. Since making her directorial debut with Every Other Weekend (1990), only A View of Love (2010) and Going Away (2013) have failed to secure César and/or Palme d'or nominations. Frustratingly, neither The Favourite Son (1994) nor Charlie Says (2006) were widely released in this country, but Place Vendôme (1998) and The Adversay (2002) proved that Garcia could coax performances of poignant power from the likes of Catherine Deneuve and Daniel Auteuil. Hopes were high, therefore, when it was announced that she would direct Marion Cotillard in From the Land of the Moon. But this adaptation of Italian writer Milena Angus's Sardinia-set novel, Mal di Pierres, is so determinedly sentimental that not even Cotillard can find truth in its melodramatic contrivances.

Some time in the 1950s, Marion Cotillard and husband Àlex Brendemühl drive from Le Ciotat to Lyon so that teenage son Victor Quilichini can compete in a piano competition at the Conservatory. Caught in traffic en route to the venue, Cotillard recognises a street name and urges the taxi driver to go on without her. As she sees Louis Garrel's name on the door, she thinks back to the immediate postwar period when she had discovered the pleasures of sensuality while standing without underwear in the fast-moving waters of the river in the Bargemon countryside.

Living with parents Daniel Para and Brigitte Roüan and her younger sister, Victoire Du Bois, Cotillard had caused a scandal by exhibiting herself naked to the farm workers below her bedroom window. She had even prayed in the local church for a man to fulfil her aching desires. But she oversteps the mark in her pursuit of Elian Planes, the married teacher who had loaned her a copy of Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights. Mistaking his generosity for a token of his affection, Cotillard spends the entire harvest feast watching Planes, as he chats with their neighbours. When he leaves the party to relieve himself, she follows and thrusts a letter into his hands. But, when he gives it back with shocked alacrity, she pushes him into the table in front of his pregnant wife before running into the woods.

Found by a search party the following morning, Cotillard is taken to the doctor by her mother, who explains about her stomach cramps and lustful excesses. But Roüan thinks that Cotillard merely needs a man to keep her in line and, when she sees him gazing at her daughter while she plays the piano, Roüan offers to set Spanish bricklayer Brendemühl up in business if he takes Cotillard off her hands. He has been a nomad since being driven out of his homeland during the Civil War and he likes the idea of settling down. But Cotillard is disdainful of his timid advances and warns him that she will be trouble. Yet, as he is about to take the bus out of town, she agrees to marry him if he will accept that she will neither love him nor sleep with him.

Brendemühl accepts Cotillard's terms and, after she experiences a crippling attack of the cramps in her room, they take communion together during their joyless nuptial mass. They move to Le Ciotat on the Mediterranean coast, where Cotillard spends the first week in bed and largely ignores her spouse before she starts helping out with his new building firm. She resents the fact he spends 200 francs on Toulon prostitutes each Saturday and agrees to sleep with him to keep the money in the family. But, while she is inspecting the house he is building for her, Cotillard suffers a miscarriage and the doctor recommends that she takes a spa cure for her kidney stones.

Treating Brendemühl to a cold embrace as she checks into the clinic in the Swiss mountains, Cotillard keeps to herself until she befriends Provençal waitress Aloïse Sauvage, who has worked at the spa for four years and regrets being unable to see her young daughter in Paris. While accompanying Sauvage on her cleaning rounds, Cotillard peers through an open door and catches sight of Louis Garrel, a lieutenant who was diagnosed with uremia after serving in Indochina. She hovers around his room when Sauvage goes to shave him and pays him another visit after seeing orderly Jihwan Kim leaving his room. Garrel explains that Kim was converted to Christianity and drafted into the French army and Cotillard admits that she has never set eyes on an Asian man before. She asks whether there will always be wars and sits silently at Garrel's bedside, as he flits in and out of consciousness after chewing some opium for the pain.

Enduring her aqua treatments and the regular glasses of warm spa water, Cotillard is pleased to see Garrel playing Tchaikovsky's `June Barcarolle' on the piano in the main recreation room. However, the effort proves too much for him and he has to be helped back to his room. Cotillard comes to sit with him and he lends her the book he has been reading and she sees his address in Lyon written on the title page. She is frustrated, therefore, when Brendemühl pays her a visit and he is hurt when she complains that it always rains when he is around. When he goes for a smoke, Cotillard slips away to cradle Garrel as he suffers an attack and she returns to her own room to take the crucifix out of her bedside drawer and thank the Lord for finally hearing her prayer. The next day, however, she sees his mattress being aired through his window and rushes back to the clinic in time to see Garrel being loaded into an ambulance and driven away. She runs though the woods to intercept the vehicle on the winding mountain road, but she is too late to say her goodbyes.

Waking to heavy snow after three days in bed, Cotillard is relieved when Garrel returns after a transfusion in Lyon. They spend time together and have their picture taken by the clinic photographer. Yet, when Cotillard offers herself to Garrel during a walk, he insists she is married before God and she hastens away through the trees in some distress. However, when they next meet in the steam room, they become lovers and Cotillard experiences the sensations she had always longed for. But, no sooner has she found happiness, than Brendemühl announces that he is no longer prepared to bear the cost of an expensive and ineffectual cure. She begs Garrel to take her away, but he needs to sort out his future career, as he is leaving the army. He promises to send for her when he is settled and Cotillard bids farewell to Sauvage with the confession that she has been happy for the first time in her life.

Returning to the home that Brendemühl has created for her, Cotillard learns she is pregnant. Du Bois comes to visit with her beau and they picnic on the beach. But Cotillard feels that Brendemühl has a right to know the truth and she informs him that she will leave him the moment Garrel calls her. Yet, while she writes endless letters, she never receives a single reply and tries to wade out into the sea when the bundle is returned unopened. Brendemühl wrestles her to the shore and holds her to prevent her doing anything foolish. But, when she fails to hear back after telling Garrel that she is expecting his child, Cotillard abandons hope and commits to raising her son.

Seven years pass and Du Bois comes to stay. She is unhappy because her workaholic husband is never home. But Cotillard urges her not to get a divorce, as she has come to learn that stability with a good man is important. Young Ange Black-Bereyziat returns from fishing in the stream with Brendemühl and eagerly shows his mother his catch. She seems content, as she changes the station on the car radio. But the sound of `June Barcarolle' reawakens suppressed emotions and she asks her son's piano tutor to teach him the piece.

As another seven years pass (in a neat panning shot depicting Cotillard's family listening intently as Quilichini plays for them. Despite the quiet pride in her eyes, Roüan complains that Cotillard shows the boy too little affection and she is stung when Brendemühl suggests that she was taught to keep such a distance during her own childhood. He urges Cotillard to let Quilichini enter the contest in Lyon and, following a quick recap of their trip, we rejoin the action as Cotillard enters Garrel's building. She rings the bell and asks Kim if he remembers her from the clinic. He informs her that Garrel died on the day he was rushed away in the ambulance and she struggles to understand what he is saying. But he reassures her that she was present on the day he passed and she is left dismayed by the realisation that she has been living a dream for 14 years.

Trying to gather her thoughts while walking along the riverbank, Cotillard misses Quilichini taking second prize. But Brendemühl remains calm when she finally catches up with them and they start the drive home. In the darkness, Cotillard asks about the day he came to the spa and we flashback to see Brendemühl leaving the table to go for a smoke. On the verandah, he meets Garrel and offers him a cigarette when he confides that he has been told his condition is terminal. He gestures towards Cotillard sitting alone in the dining room and admits that he could have loved her in another life, but neither his body nor his heart is up to the task. As she listens to Brendemühl in the car, he reveals that he had been unable to sleep at the village inn and had slipped into Cotillard's bed and she had welcomed his advances without protest.

Arriving home, Cotillard goes to the cupboard in which she has kept the suitcase she has not unpacked since returning from the spa. She opens the medical file in which she had hidden the photograph she had taken with Garrel and is stunned to see herself posing on the edge of an empty chair. Wandering into the garden, she finds Brendemühl watching the sun coming up over the sea. She asks why he had never told her the truth and he simply replies that he had wanted her to live. As the film ends, Cotillard and Brendemühl pick their way through some rocky terrain overlooking his hometown. She asks him to point out his house, as she looks at him with something approaching admiration.

Marion Cotillard has become one of those actors who seem incapable of giving a poor performance. She barely registers a flicker of emotion in this novelettish saga and, yet, one is never left in any doubt about how her wilful heroine is feeling at any given moment. Àlex Brendemühl and Louis Garrel are no more demonstrative in providing selfless support. But such mannered playing and threadbare characterisation makes it difficult for the audience to empathise with individuals who exist solely for Nicole Garcia and co-scenarist Jacques Fieschi to pull off the kind of coup de théâtre that one usually associates with M. Night Shyamalan.

Indeed, it's easy to pine for Paolo Sorrentino's Youth (2015), as Cotillard and Garrel exchange meaningful looks like Malcolm McDowell and Nanette Newman in Bryan Forbes's The Raging Moon (1971). But one has to admire Christophe Beaucarne's contrasting views of the rural, coastal and Alpine settings and Arnaud de Moleron's thoughtful interiors. Even Daniel Pemberton's lush string score fits the tone. Yet, this never acquires the sense of significance denoted by its dilatory pacing, as Garcia skates over themes of female desire, familial expectation, mental health and the colonial legacy. Consequently, for all the elegant artistry and sincere care that has gone into its making, this rarely feels like anything more than an old-fashioned weepie.

The second Dochouse offering of the week is Bob Hercules and Rita Coburn Whack's Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise. Four years in the making, this affectionate, but rather conservative profile includes some of the last interviews that Angelou gave before her death at the age of 86 in 2014. Presenting a chronological overview that will be comfortingly familiar to admirers, this is packed with familiar faces falling over themselves to say nice things about a woman who helped define African-American literature and socio-cultural identity during the last four decades of the last century. But a lack of hard-edged analysis leaves this feeling a little paeanic.

Born in St Louis, Missouri on 4 April 1928, Marguerite Annie Johnson got the nickname `Maya' from her older brother, Bailey, with whom she went to live with grandmother Annie Henderson in Stamps, Arkansas after parents Bailed and Vivian Johnson parted company when she was three years old. The daughter of a freed slave and the owner of the only black store in town, Annie ensured that Bailey and Maya received a solid education to make up for being rejected by their divorcing parents. However, she was subjected to endless racism by the poor whites who lived on the land she had bought and Angelou recalls how her paralysed Uncle Willie often had to hide in the potato store when the local Klansmen came riding in their hoods to accuse him falsely of touching innocent white girls.

Television footage of Angelou returning to Stamps for the first time in three decades in 1982 is followed by a clip from Fielder Cook's 1979 adaptation of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings that recreates the KKK episode. But things scarcely improved after Bailey and Maya went to live with Vivian in St Louis, as the seven year-old was raped by her mother's boyfriend, who was kicked to death within hours of being released from prison. Convinced her tongue had brought about his death (because she had told Bailey the name Freeman, which is not mentioned here), Maya refused to speak for five years. However, teacher Bertha Flowers coaxed her into reciting poetry and she encouraged her to read every book she could find in the school library.

A clip follows of Angelou reading `The Mask', about a maid riding a bus in New York and using laughter to hide her true feelings. Angelou wipes away a tear at the end of the recitation, but there are nothing but smiles when she joins actress Cicely Tyson for the unveiling of her portrait at the Smithsonian Institute in 2012. She holds a Q&A session and declares her pride at raising her son, Guy Johnson, whom she had originally named Clyde after she had sex at 16 in San Francisco with a boy who had long admired her. Angelou admits to the camera that she thought sex was a huge disappointment, but it was worth it to become a mother.

In 1951, Angelou married Tosh Angelos, a well-read Greek electrician who had no qualms about her colour or the fact Vivian initially disowned her. Yet, by the time they split up, she had come to like her son-in-law so much that she denounced her daughter for divorcing him. Guy recalls moving around a lot during this period and how he often got into fights at school because his mother kept wearing African fashions. She urged him to be proud of his royal heritage, but such claims merely convinced him that she was crazy, especially as she was working at the time as a dancer in seedy nightclubs. However, she soon started to make a name for herself as a singer and actress Diahann Carroll and dancer Don Martin recall how statuesque and rhythmic she looked when she performed barefoot on stage.

Known as `Miss Calypso', she appeared in Fred F. Sears's Calypso Heat Wave (1957) and also landed the role of Ruby in a production of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess that toured the world between 1954-55. She is seen with Ingrid Bergman in a photograph before she tells how she sang a spiritual at a concert in Morocco and brought the house down because the words of its slave composer meant more to the Arab audience than the classical works her castmates had been singing. Seguing from the 1982 Stamps footage (where she is giving a talk in the local church) to a talking-head interview, Angelou performs the song and her voice is just as strong in her 80s as it had been three decades earlier.

After many years on the road, Angelou hoped to get a steady job in New York. She auditioned to be Pearl Bailey's understudy in the 1967 Broadway production of Hello, Dolly! But, while the director and producer loved her, Bailey refused to have such an `ugly' girl as her understudy and Angelou lost the part. Yet, as Guy Johnson recalls through clenched teeth, when Bailey received a lifetime achievement award, she asked for Angelou to present it and the-then famous author agreed without mentioning their past encounter.

While singing, Angelou had started writing and Harlem Renaissance legends like Langston Hughes and John Oliver Killens had urged her to join their circle to nurture her talent. Louise Meriwether and Nikki Giovanni recall the constructive criticism they received and the hangouts where they could be themselves. One bar was tended by James Baldwin's brother and Angelou recalls having met the exiled writer in Paris in the 1950s. They had quickly become friends and actor Lou Gossett, Jr. remembers them hitting it off and she admits being inspired by his anger (which is seen being vented in a celebrated clip from The Dick Cavett Show).

But Angelou also warmed to the passive resistance being preached by Dr Martin Luther King, Jr. and, in 1960, she teamed with comedian Godfrey Cambridge to write the musical revue Cabaret for Freedom to raise money for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference that was pivotal to the Civil Rights cause. Yet she also befriended Malcolm X at Lewis Michaux's bookshop and Gossett notes that she shared his rage against what she called `the white devil'. She participated in a protest at the United Nations after the murder of Patrice Lumumba in the Congo and Johnson remembers her sticking a police horse with a hat pin so that the sergeant riding fell off and the demonstrators who had melted away at the sight of the mounted ranks slowly slipped back into line to finish the march.

Editor Robert Loomis recalls seeing Angelou for the first time in the cast of Jean Genet's The Blacks in 1960, in which she played the White Queen alongside Tyson, Gossett, Roscoe Lee Browne and James Earl Jones. The play caused quite a stir and Loomis admits to have felt ashamed to be white after watching it. Tyson recalls Angelou meeting South African freedom fighter Vusumzi Make around this time and they became an item, even after her Brooklyn landlady had pointed out that he was a little fat man. Friend Alice Windom suggests he did much to refine her political thinking, but he was not as liberated in his gender politics and they parted while they were living in Cairo I 1961.

As Johnson wanted to study in Ghana, they moved to Accra, where he promptly broke his neck in a traffic accident and Angelou remained in the city for four years, while her son recovered and completed her studies. She landed a job at the university and revelled in the cultural boom fostered by Kwame Nkrumah. Roommate Windom reminisces about the parties they used to have, while Angelou marvels at the breadth and depth of the conversations. She also played host to Malcolm X when he came to Ghana and tried to find an African leader who would be willing to charge the USA with genocide in the United Nations, but the newly independent states were all too dependent on American money to risk upsetting Washington.

Angelou returned Stateside in 1965 to help Malcolm set up the Organisation of Afro-American Unity, but he was assassinated before they could make much progress. She reveals that Dr King was shot on her 40th birthday in 1968 and she slipped into another bout of mutism. However, Baldwin refused to let her wallow and took her to meet cartoonist Jules Feiffer and encouraged her to tell stories about her life in Stamps, where racism was so all-pervading that blacks were not allowed to eat vanilla ice cream. Judy Feiffer was so impressed, she called Loomis at Random House and insisted that Angelou had a book in her.

By this time, Angelou was in Los Angeles working on the PBS series, Blacks, Blues, Black!, and had no desire to write anything other than poetry and plays. But, after a lengthy pursuit, Loomis persuaded her to attempt a childhood memoir and I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings was published in 1969. Initially, sales were slow, but it established a new genre and Cicely Tyson, Diahann Carroll, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, film director John Singleton, actress Alfre Woodard, academic Eugene Redmond, singer Valerie Simpson and hip hop artist Common all testify to the impact it made on their lives.

Loomis notes that Angelou liked to hibernate while she wrote and would book a hotel room so she could become immersed. Always working in longhand (and with a dram or two along the way), she used a vocabulary rooted in the Bible and Victorian literature and made it relevant to the black experience. She felt she was following Frederick Douglass in writing the `slave narrative' in the first person when she really meant the third and Loomis and Redmond comment on the simplicity and immediacy of her style. Angelou herself reveals that she had often doubted whether God wanted her to use commonplace words to express ideas in a new way. But the challenge drove her on and the critics began to respond as positively as her readers.

There were still bumps in the road, however. She met Welsh carpenter-turned-writer Paul Du Feu and had turned down his marriage proposal because he was white. Baldwin had accused her of cowardice in not proclaiming her love in the face of bigotry and they tied the knot. Yet, while Tyson and Wilson suggest the former husband of Germaine Greer was the closest she got to a soulmate, Johnson recalls the author of Let's Hear It for the Long-Legged Women (1973) being fond of his drink and regrets that his mother never found lasting love after they split in 1981.

She kept finding new avenues, however, as she recorded with Ashford and Simpson and collaborated with Quincy Jones on some songs for BB King to sing on the soundtrack of Daniel Mann's Sidney Poitier vehicle, For the Love of Ivy (1968). By all accounts, she had an unhappy liaison with King, but nothing seemed to stop her in this period. She played the grandmother of Kunta Kinte in the landmark TV series, Roots (1977), and continued her autobiography with Gather Together in My Name (1974), Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas (1976):and The Heart of a Woman (1981). Angelou also wrote `On the Pulse of Morning' for Bill Clinton's inauguration in January 1993 and managed to capture the inclusive spirit that should pervade the nation.

Yet, she ticked off the young girl asking her a question on one TV show for daring to use her first name, even though she had sung about being called Maya on Sesame Street. She became a fixture on the lecture and chat show circuits and continued to act in pictures like Jocelyn Moorhouse's How to Make an American Quilt (1995). Three years later, she made her directorial debut with Down in the Delta, on which Alfre Woodard insisted on called her Ms Maya because she felt too unworthy to use her first name. Such was her curiosity that she even wrote something for a Common album. But she gave him a public dressing down for using the N-word and countered his cultural reclamation arguments by saying poison in a fine glass goblet is still noxious. On the set of John Singleton's Poetic Justice (1993), she took aside a young man using foul language while arguing with another black man and Angelou had no idea she was putting a protective arm around Tupac Shakur.

Oprah Winfrey reveals what a tower of strength Angelou has been for her and archive footage shows comedian Dave Chappelle citing her as a role model. A bellhop at a venue where she was speaking also wanted her to know how much she meant to him and Hillary Clinton remarks on how her phenomenal energy and reluctance to disappoint kept her in the public eye right up until her death on 28 May 2014. Woodard concludes by saying she is grateful for having been alive during her lifetime, but the last word goes to Angelou, whose reading of `Still I Rise' plays over the closing credits.

A life this full and this significant deserves a documentary on the scale of Ezra Edelman's OJ: Made in America. Despite their best efforts, Hercules and Coburn Whack have only produced a primer that touches on many of the major events in Maya Angelou's personal and professional lives without exploring any of them in any objective depth. This is a eulogy rather than a study and it will leave those hoping for cogent insights into Angelou's beliefs, activities and writings will be more than a little disappointed.

Editors Lillian Benson and David E. Simpson merit a mention for the deftness of the audiovisual patchwork. But so much is missing from Angelou's early life, her involvement with the Civil Rights campaign and the later stages of her literary career. There's no mention, for example, of the final autobiographical volumes, All God's Children Need Travelling Shoes (1986) and A Song Flung Up to Heaven (2002), let alone such screen landmarks as Stig Björkman's Georgia, Georgia (1972), which boasted the first produced screenplay by an African-American woman. Moreover, no attempt is made to discuss Angelou's poetry or how it evolved. Eugene Redmond alludes to the conservatism of her language, but no one else ventures more than adoring platitudes that are of little quantifiable use.

Given the unique access that the co-directors had to both Angelou and her son, this unsurprisingly contains many choice moments. But the absence of dissenting voices leaves one wondering how much editorialising has been done by the estate, especially where Angelou's private life is concerned. The whole point was that she admitted to not being a saint, but this adulatory valediction strays too often towards hagiography and too rarely away from her own printed record for it to be anything more than a good starting point for a more comprehensive, forensic and balanced work. along the lines of Raoul Peck's Oscar-nominated treatise on James Baldwin, I Am Not Your Negro.