Parky at the Pictures (In Cinemas 17/7/2014)

In fact, contemplative cinema has existed for over half a century, with Michelangelo Antonioni's L'Avventura (1960) being an important early example. Subsequently, several film-makers have become known for the languor and rigour of their style, including Miklós Jancsó, Andre Tarkovsky, Theo Angelopoulos, Béla Tarr, Alexander Sokurov, Tsai Ming-liang,  Pedro Costa, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Bruno Dumont, Carlos Reygadas, Lisandro Alonso, Nicolas Pereda, Albert Serra and Ben Rivers. Philippine auteur Lav Diaz ranks highly among the masters of Slow Cinema. But, even though his films are notable for their epic running times, it's the pacing of the pictures not their length that makes them `slow'.

Diaz established his reputation with such relatively short features as Serafin Geronimo: The Criminal of Barrio Concepcion (1998; 132 mins), Burger Boys (1999; 103 mins) and Hesus the Revolutionary (2002; 102 mins). But, since he took 315 minutes over Batang West Side (2001), Diaz has made magnitude a virtue in producing Evolution of a Filipino Family (2004; 643 mins); Heremias (Book One: The Legend of the Lizard Princess) (2006; 540 mins); Death in the Land of Encantos (2007; 540 mins), Melancholia (2008; 450 mins); Century of Birthing (2012; 360 mins); Florentina Hubaldo, CTE (2012; 360 mins); and From What Is Before (2014; 338 mins).

Checking in at a mere 250 minutes, Norte, The End of History is something of a miniature. Moreover, unlike many of Diaz's early works, it's in colour. But it retains the fascination with Fedor Dostoevsky that has been a recurring aspect of Diaz's oeuvre, as it translates the core action of Crime and Punishment to Paoay in the northern province of Ilocos Norte, which was the birthplace of Ferdinand Marcos, a law student who killed a political rival of his father shortly after his 18th birthday before going on to become President of the Philippines in 1965. Yet, while Diaz is not averse to a little historico-literary allegory, he is primarily concerned with the plight of the Filipino poor. Thus, as much attention is paid to the collateral victims of the murderous student's crime than his conscience-stricken torment.

Indolent, opinionated and indebted, Sid Lucero has dropped out of law school and resides in a single-room shack on the outskirts of Paoay. He divides his time between espousing his reactionary political views with former professors Perry Dizon and Moira Lang and shooting the breeze with a cabal of contemporaries that comprises Luis Galang III, Sheen Gener, Ian Lomongo and Lex Marcos. Lucero scrounges money off everyone and cheats on Marcos behind his back with Gener, who is attracted by his uncompromising attitudes and short fuse.

During a boozy trip to the country, Lucero tosses away his mobile phone and declares truth and justice to be dead during a discussion of recent Philippine history. Another drinking session with his pals sees him mock a cult basing its predictions of the end of the world on the Mayan calendar and lament the fact that nobody any longer has the courage of their revolutionary convictions. He also informs Perry and Lang that the only cure for an ailing society is to eradicate the bad elements dragging it down.

Doubtless, Lucero would consider Archie Alemania to be such a malign drone, as he has had to resort to moneylender Mae Paner since breaking his leg. Yet, Alemania and wife Angeli Bayani were about to open a diner before the accident and they sell off their cutlery, crockery and fattened pig with great reluctance. Ironically, Lucero also has dealings with Paner and deeply resents being in thrall to someone he considers beneath him. While Alemania recovers, auntie Hazel Orencio looks after six year-old Aneeza Hernandez and four year-old AJ Ballat while their mother hawks vegetables on a barrow. Alemania tries to help by flogging DVDs, but Bayani has to pawn a treasured ring to keep the family afloat and Paner's teenage daughter, Julia Domingo, is one of many witnesses to the frustrated Alemania's foolish assault on the heartless usurer, in which he tries to throttle her.

Ashamed of himself, Alemania accepts a job on a building site in Batac and leaves home shortly after Christmas. Back in Paoay, Lucero also allows his emotions to get the better of him when he tells Marcos about his fling with Gener and a scuffle breaks out. Still seething with resentment, Lucero decides to put his theories into practice and knocks on Paner's door late at night and informs her he has come to settle his account. Instead, he stabs her brutally and dispatches Domingo when she comes to investigate the noise.

Lucero returns to his shack and spends a night in agony, as he realises the enormity of his misdeed. He buries a box of trinkets stolen from Paner's safe and tries to sleep. But he is wracked with guilt and breaks off all ties with his friends before seeking anonymous sanctuary in Manila. Alemenia is also on the move, as his earlier contretemps with Paner leads to him being charged with her murder and he is sent to Laong City Jail after lawyer Paolo Rodriguez urges him to plead guilty. Bayani is distraught, but powerless to help her spouse because Rodriguez has missed the deadline to lodge an appeal.

Cellmate Noel Sta. Domingo encourages Alemania to suppress any hope of a reprieve and get himself used to the idea of being inside, as this will be his life from now on and he will need all his wits about him if he is to survive. However, as he confides that he is going to Manila the next day to assassinate a politician for an influential client, Domingo also urges Alemania to cling on to his essential decency, as he has now killed so many times that he no longer feels human.

By contrast, Lucero is very much a troubled soul, as he finds a job in a diner alongside Clement Andrada III, Dea Formacil and Spider Rodas. Andrade cheers him up by doing magic tricks, but Formacil fails to provide similar solace through religion when she drags Lucero to a prayer group. He mocks her suggestion that God will forgive whatever sins he has committed and he slouches back to his room to close the shutters and hang a set of heavy curtains that plunge him into deeper darkness. Bayani also comes close to despair after Alemania is transferred to a distant prison that will make it impossible for her to visit and she considers killing herself and her children by jumping off a cliff. However, she takes them to the fair instead and they experience a rare moment of joy as they ride on a carousel.

In order to convey the passage of time and the distance that now separates Bayani from her husband, a swooping aerial shot traverses the landscape before coming to rest in Alemania's new cell. He tells fellow inmate Kristian Chua about his children (now two years older and played by Adelanne Hernandez and Luis Miguel Nicolas). But they fall foul of wing bigwig Soliman Cruz, who beats Chua mercilessly for looking at him in a funny way while he is singing a Christmas carol after presenting the prisoners with gifts. Shortly afterwards, Cruz summons Alemania to his cell and cuts his hands with a knife to put him in his place for continuing to plead his innocence.

Back in Paoay, Orencio takes Hernandez and Nicolas on a snail hunt, while Bayani hauls her cart around the neighbourhood. She rises at dawn to take delivery of her produce and is exhausted by the time magic hour light frames her against the river. At weekends, the whole family does laundry to make a few extra pennies and Bayani has to reassure the children that their father is a good man after Hernandez is teased at school. After watching fires burning on the opposite bank, she even confides to Orencio that she wishes she had let Alemania work abroad, as he would now be safe and sending them much-needed money.

What Bayani doesn't know, however, is that she is frequently watched by Lucero, who has returned to his shack and is aware that Alemania is serving time for his crime. One night, he digs up the box he had hidden years before and pawns its contents to hand Bayani an envelope full of cash. She cannot fathom the reason for such charity and Perry and Lang are also taken aback when Lucero meets them in a bar and asks them to re-open Alemania's case because he knows he is innocent. He even patches things up with Marcos before going to visit his religious sister, Mailes Kanapi. She is delighted to see him and coaxes him to stay and help her run the farm. But he declares that he no longer has a family and brutally rapes her before punishing himself by killing the pet dog that seems to have been the only thing he ever loved.

Meanwhile, Cruz falls ill and Alemania takes it upon himself to care for him. As Alemania massages the emaciated thug on his bunk, Cruz begs for forgiveness and calls him an angel for resisting the temptation to avenge his slashing. Bayani comes to visit her husband and he gives her the paper lanterns he has made for the now 12 and 10 year-old Charlotte and Joel Cabacungan. Bayani apologises for not coming to see him earlier and they hug as Alemania tells her to remind the children that he is always with them.

Cutting from a shot of the couple sitting in the shade of a tree, Diaz lets the camera rove over torched ground beside a motorway flyover. What looks like the frame of one of Alemania's lanterns lies in the smouldering ashes. An aerial shot returns the action to Alemania's cell, where he levitates above his bunk and the walls of his cell are replaced by a canopy of tall trees with the sun trying to peep through the branches. Somewhere in the countryside, Lucero asks a young fisherman to row him out into the river and the camera lingers on the silhouetted boat in the far distance. As the film ends, Bayani and her offspring walk down a dusty lane towards a farm that may or may not be their heavenly reward.

Coming after four hours of grinding grimness, this climactic bout of magic realism may seem a touch out of place. It certainly has no precedent in Dostoevsky, although Diaz and co-scenarist Rody Vera actually take very little from the 1866 source. Diaz may well be sparing the audience the shocking deaths of Alemania's family, as they fall victim to supposed progress. Whatever the intention, this fantastical conceit does seem rather gratuitous and will puzzle as much as it moves or exhilarates. Nevertheless, Diaz is no stranger to such abstract austerity and the sequences do confirm the brilliance of Perry Dizon's production design and Lauro Rene Manda's cinematography, which is more fluid than in the majority of Diaz features, even though the preferred shooting style remains the static tableau.

However, the denouement also highlights the picture's tendency to take unexpected narratorial turns and the fact that Diaz (who often adopts improvisatory methods) appears to have little interest in character development and none at all in presenting secondary figures as anything other than ciphers. He certainly struggles to elicit a convincing display of intellectual rage and moral bankruptcy from Lucero, who spouts philosophical notions with as little conviction as he commits acts of cynical venality, savage brutality and hesitant penitence. Alemania is marginally more persuasive, while Bayani ably conveys the exhausting strain of raising a family in the face of injustice. But they rather come across as plaster saints and there is something patronising about Diaz's contention that purity only equates to poverty in modern Philippine society.

Notwithstanding these flaws, this never feels like the arduous chore its extent would suggest. Indeed, it often feels less onerous than Philippe Garrel's Jealousy, which runs for a mere 77 minutes. This isn't to say that this single-minded auteur's 24th feature is anything other than engaging, visually ravishing and frequently touching. But time does hang heavy in some of the longueurs in this semi-autobiographical saga, which marks the fifth occasion that Garrel has cast his son Louis as his leading man.

In the five decades since he debuted among the last flickering embers of the nouvelle vaguei with Les Enfants désaccordés (1964), Garrel has consistently explored themes of intimacy and alienation and demonstrated a singularity of vision that has been described by critic Tony McKibbin as `voyeurism of the soul'. Whether working alone or as part of the Zanzibar collective, Garrel's conviction that the moving image equated to `Freud plus Lumière' made him a darling on the festival circuit and a cult figure within French cinema, alongside the likes of Jean Eustache and Maurice Pialat. Yet, while he was championed by Jean-Luc Godard and hailed as the cine-Rimbaud, Garrel's rarefied style was also supposedly the inspiration for the mocking Monty Python sketch, `French Subtitled Film'.

The son of actor Maurice Garrel, he collaborated frequently in the 1970s with German lover Nico (of Velvet Underground fame) on such pictures as The Inner Scar (1972), which comprises a mere 23 mostly static shots of Nico, Garrel and Pierre Clémenti (amongst others) walking slowly through arresting landscapes in Sinai, Death Valley and Iceland. By contrast, the six year-old Louis Garrel made his acting bow alongside his father and grandfather in Emergency Kisses (1989), which chronicles the fallout when a famous director plans a film about his own life and upsets wife Brigitte Sy by casting rival actress Anémone as his screen spouse.

Dedicated to Nico and seemingly riven with autobiographical regret, I Can No Longer Hear the Guitar (1991) provides a more elliptical look at the breakdown of a marriage, as it follows Parisian couples Benoît Régent and Johanna ter Steege and Yann Collette and Mireille Perrier on holiday to the Italian coast. Replete with wordplay, Heidegger references, poetry recitals and a score by John Cale, this teases all the more by co-starring Garrel's now ex-wife, Brigitte Sy, as the mistress in whom Régent seeks solace when Ter Steege starts blowing their money and their happiness on heroin.

Love, need and heroin are also to the fore in Night Wind (1999), another collaboration with John Cale that sees artist Xavier Beauvois cling to housewife Catherine Deneuve before her insecurities prompt him to take a road trip with 60s relic Daniel Duval. And this treatise on desire, disillusion and self-destruction finds echo in Jealousy, which is screening at the Ciné Lumière in London alongside the aforementioned titles in a short season devoted to Garrel.

Eight year-old Olga Milshtein wakes in the night and wanders out of her bedroom to hear mother Rebecca Covenant begging partner Louis Garrel not to leave her. She backs away from the keyhole, as she sees her father approaching, and rushes back to bed as he slouches out through the front door. A caption reading `I Looked After Angels' signals the passage of several months and Milshtein returns home after spending the day with her father. She shows Covenant the pictures she has drawn and seems to be coping with the separation much better than her mother.

Garrel has also moved on and is sharing a garret with Anna Mouglalis, a fellow actor who is struggling more than he is to make her name on the Parisian stage. When they meet up at a café, she listens to him chatting with pal Arthur Igual about their co-star, Manon Kneusé, and forces a smile when they tease her about how pretty she is. As they walk home, Mouglalis kisses Garrel. But she is not the only one he wraps up against the cold in his jacket, as, a few days later, he coddles Milshtein as they wait at a bus stop and they also walk along hand in hand as the light fades.

But Milshstein has to content herself with going home to Covenant, who only has her daughter's excitement for consolation. Garrel feels a touch envious himself when Mouglalis takes him to visit Robert Bazil, an academic who befriended her when she bought a signed copy of his biography of Russian polymath Vladimir Mayakovsky. She washes the old man's feet before he goes for a nap and joshes Garrel as he looks on. However, he gets his own back when she drops into the theatre and sees him flirting with Kneusé. As a consequence, Mouglalis abandons a lunch date with Florence Payros to rush across town to check Garrel is not cheating on her back at the flat. She is relieved to find him alone and he is charmed and concerned by her suspicion.

Six years have passed since Mouglalis last landed a role and Garrel tries to cheer her up after another failed audition. However, when he leaves for the theatre, Mouglalis goes to a bar and picks up stranger Julien Lucas when they go outside to smoke. She slips away from his apartment before Garrel gets home and perhaps covets the room she has just seen, as she bangs her head on a cupboard in frustration at having to live in such a tiny space. Garrel wonders if she still loves him and tries to make her feel better by introducing her to Milshtein. They spend a day in the park and Mouglalis defies Garrel by buying Milshtein a lollipop from a kiosk.

She also lets her keep her hat and Covenant is nettled by her child's enthusiasm for the woman who stole her father away. Yet, when Milshtein asks awkward questions about the break-up, Covenant protects Garrel and also retains her composure when Milshtein says how cool Mouglalis is and scoffs at the fact that Covenant had stayed in all afternoon tidying her room and making soup. Realising she might have hurt her mother's feelings, Milshtein asks if they can have the same kind of `communal sandwich' she had enjoyed with Garrel and Mouglalis and Covenant agrees before spending the evening sewing alone.

Across Paris, Garrel kisses Kneusé backstage and Mouglalis senses something is wrong when she wakes to his touch. He insists that he adores her and they embrace. But the second chapter heading, `Sparks in a Powder Keg', suggests that something ominous is about to occur and Mouglalis is not a good enough actress to convince when she insists she is happy when Garrel returns from a few days away, during which time she had cheated on him at another backstreet bar.

Garrel gets a visit from his sister, Esther Garrel, who wishes she had a better memory of their father. However, as Garrel sits in his dressing-room, middle-aged stranger Emanuela Ponzano pops her head around the door and introduces herself as an old flame of his father's and he tries to be polite. He is still feeling nonplussed when Mouglalis gets home from dinner with old friend Sofia Teillet and announces that architect Eric Ruillat has offered her a job as his archivist and Garrel is disappointed that she is going to give up on her acting dream for such a dull office post.

Lounging around backstage, Garrel surprises co-stars Igual and Jérôme Huguet by saying he would blow his brains out if Mouglalis ever left him. But, when he gets home, he finds her ranting about her lack of light, space and happiness and she orders him to get a properly paid acting job or return to the real world. Refusing to compromise his lifestyle, Garrel takes Milshtein to the pictures and, during the screening, touches the hand of the woman sitting next to him. As they leave, Mathilde Bisson scribbles her name and number on her cinema ticket, but he tears it up because Milshtein keeps pestering him to call her, as he feels one stepmother is more than enough.

On returning home, however, he finds a note from Mouglalis stating that she needs some time to herself. Failing to understand the gravity of the situation, Milshtein accuses Garrel of being jealous and slaps him across the face. But, rather than lose his temper with his daughter, he tickles her and they have a play fight. As she gets ready for bed, Milshtein asks Garrel if he loved his father more than he loves her and he says not. But he is confused about what he feels for Mouglalis and goes to see old tutor Jean Pommier, who informs him that he was always better at understanding the characters he was playing than the people he knew.

Mouglalis tries to matchmake Garrel's sister and Ruillat over lunch, but they don't seem to hit it off. However, Garrel senses something is going on when Mouglalis shows him around a spacious apartment that has been given to her as a gift by an admirer. He asks if she is trying to hurt him and sulks throughout a dinner party she hosts at the garret for some friends. As Garrel tidies up, Mouglalis starts packing a bag because she has another man waiting for her and he is appalled that she could remain so calm during supper when she knew she was going to desert him. Refusing to listen, Mouglalis storms out and Garrel goes for a walk after pacing the room in considerable distress.

An abrupt cut reveals a gun on the table and the shirtless Garrel snaps the clip into place and knocks off the safety catch before stepping out of shot to wound himself in the chest. His sister visits him in hospital and admonishes Mouglalis for not coming to see him. He says he wants nothing more to do with her and Esther urges Louis to stay strong before slipping in the news that he has been fired from his play.

As he recuperates, Garrel goes strolling with Milshtein. They bump into Kneusé, who has been cast in a major production. She promises to call him, but he has his doubts as he sits on a park bench and waits for his sister to catch up with some snacks. Milshtein inquires Garrel what he did before she was born and then asks Esther why she hasn't had a baby. She laughs and confides that they are very expensive and offers Milshtein some nuts. That night, Garrel feels alone in his garret and the picture ends as he switches off the light.

Gloriously photographed in atmospheric monochrome by Willy Kurant, edited with finesse by Yann Dedet and scored with mischievous charm by Jean-Louis Aubert, this could have been made at any time between 1959 and 1967. Indeed, if it wasn't so intensely serious in its depiction of la vie bohème moderne, this could easily be mistaken for a pastiche. The tousle-haired Louis does his father proud, as does Milshtein in the role that was inspired by Garrel père's own childhood experiences. She particularly excels in her scenes with Covenant, who would seem to have done well to have held on to Garrel for so long, as he is clearly an emotionally immature narcissist who meets his match in the even needier and more detached Mouglalis.

Garrel and co-writers Marc Cholodenko, Caroline Deruas-Garrel and Arlette Langmann have stuffed the scenario with moments of poignant naturalism, excruciating pretentiousness and clumsy melodrama. But, while the scenario might have benefited from being as spartan as Manu de Chauvigny's sets, Garrel sticks to what he knows best in impressionistically dissecting domestic and romantic mores. He struggles to accommodate the majority of the secondary characters, but ably conveys the incestuousness of the Parisian creative scene, while also capturing human foible and durability with an evidently still painful ring of truth. Thus, while this may not be Garrel's finest film, it's still always a treat to see something new from the ever-dwindling band of nouvelle vaguers.

The emphasis is also firmly on the romantic in Grand Central, Rebecca Zlotowski's follow-up to Belle Épine (2010), which reunites her with several cast members and also sees her exploring the dynamic within another close-knit community of outsiders. In her debut feature, the band were female motorcycle racers. But Zlotowski switches her attention this time to the unskilled workers detailed to carry out routine cleaning and maintenance work on a nuclear power station in the Rhône Valley. Making evocative use of an Austrian facility that was never used and shifting deftly between digital imagery for the industrial interiors and 35mm for the quotidian sequences, Zlotowski generates plenty of dramatic tension and sexual frisson. But the melodramatic comparisons between the clandestine lovers and the plant's potential dangers prove as enervating as the mediocre characterisation and the forced efforts to turn this into a latterday Western.

As Tahar Rahim travels without a ticket on the train to Cruas, he has his pocket picked by Johan Libéreau, who is also hoping to be hired by the nuclear plant that has been advertising for workers with to undertake risky, but well-paid menial work. The pair become fast friends after Rahim gets his own back on the rascally Libéreau and they hook up with his pal Nahuel Pérez Biscayart's van while their applications are being processed. While drinking in a bar, Rahim impresses plant veterans Olivier Gourmet and Denis Ménochet by riding a mechanical bull and they offer him a bunk at their camper site outside the perimeter.

Gourmet is a worrier and cautions Rahim to follow the rules to the letter, as the materials they handle are toxic and levels of contamination can build up terrifyingly quickly. Ménochet recognises something of himself in Rahim and lends him some money while he is taking the aptitude tests to judge his suitability. As he needs a character reference, Rahim pays a visit to estranged sister Margot Faure, who has heard the scare stories about nuclear power and tries to persuade him to find another job. However, he returns to Cruas, where he already feels that Gourmet and Ménochet are more supportive than his real family.

As they drink in the bar that night, Rahim is astonished to be kissed by a striking blonde, who informs him that the sensation he has just experienced is what a dose of radiation feels like. She sits on Ménochet's knee and he introduces her as his fiancée, Léa Seydoux. The following morning, Rahim, Libéreau and Pérez Biscayart learn that they have been accepted and they collect their hard hats and safety clothing. Gourmet supervises them as they don the equipment for the first time and makes sure they know about its safe disposal at the end of each shift and the need to take a thorough shower.

The trio are nervous on entering the main hub for the first time and the sense of foreboding is exacerbated by the sound of their breathing apparatus and the eerie silence that hangs over the cooling pools. They watch as Ménochet goes out to the core in a special suit to retrieve a dropped tool and the supervisor confides that few men can match his courage. Still on tenterhooks, the newcomers are taken to the laundry where Seydoux works and Rahim stares at her through a protective grille. Gourmet also shows them the machine that tests the levels of radiation on their hands and warns them never to look round if the alarm goes off behind them, as the person involved wouldn't want to be stared at with his livelihood and health in jeopardy.

On payday, Seydoux invites a friend to join the boys on a trip in a flashy open-top car. They drive into the country with loud rap blaring and Seydoux and Rahim leave the others to wander along the riverbank. Once out of sight, they begin kissing among the bulrushes. But Seydoux is back on Ménochet's knee that night, as they sit under the stars listening to Camille Lellouche singing an old pop song about the perils of love. The following day, Gourmet is involved in a scare and Rahim watches two workers arguing furiously about who is to blame for the leak.

He is relieved when Gourmet is released unharmed, but is stung when he receives a clip around the ear for his conduct while they were out over a bottle of water and Gourmet reminds him that they are a team and any breaches reflect badly on him. Vowing to keep his head down and his nose clean, Rahim goes to Ménochet's caravan to pay back his loan. Seydoux answers the door and tells him that she loves her man and would never dream of hurting him. Rahim nods, but they end up kissing passionately again that evening and they renew their vow to do the right thing by their mutual friend.

Some time later, Rahim and Libéreau are sent to repair a leak on an upper level and have to use climbing harnesses to reach the spot. However, they fail to complete the task in the allotted time and the pair are furious with each other as they drive home. Unable to sleep, Rahim goes for a walk and bumps into Seydoux smoking in the yard. He follows at a distance as she wanders along the riverbank and waits for him in a boat at the end of the jetty. They slip the mooring and find a quiet spot to make love. As she undresses, Seydoux goes to say something, but stops herself.

Despite taking the utmost care to avoid detection, Seydoux is spotted returning from one of her walks by Ménochet, who wonders where she has been. Rahim and his pals go to the zoo to look at the crocodiles and enjoy the freedom that a little money has afforded them. However, their work remains dangerous and Rahim risks his own safety to assist Ménochet when his oxygen line becomes entangled while they are operating pressurised water jets. He is applauded by his workmates. But, in biting through his pressure suit to allow Ménochet to breathe, Rahim also exposed him to the toxic atmosphere and receives a dose himself.

Doctor Nozha Khouadra informs Rahim that he has absorbed close to his limit and has him transferred to the green zone so he can keep working. He takes extra precautions to scrub up after each shift. But he doesn't take as much care with Seydoux and Khouadra not only breaks the news that she is pregnant, but also that she will have some explaining to do, as Ménochet has long been impotent through working at the plant. She conceals the truth from Rahim and they spend an idyllic afternoon together lying naked in the long grass. A siren blares out from the plant and Seydoux explains that the number of repeats denotes the severity of the emergency.

They get back to find Lellouche has had her hair shaved because she has been exposed and she begs Seydoux to put on her wedding dress to cheer her up and show daughter Kessy Magnary how beautiful she is going to be. However, health and safety officer Marie Berto comes to the camp and accuses Gourmet of letting standards slip. He counters by charging the company with hiring unskilled labour to cut costs and the simmering tension leads Rahim and Libéreau to fall out, with the latter threatening to tell Ménochet about the affair if the former reports the fact that he has been bending the rules by hiding his monitor outside the core area to avoid giving accurate dosage readings.

Anxious about Ménochet finding out about the baby and still not sure how to tell Rahim, Seydoux misses their next assignation. But, when they go for a group picnic, Ménochet notices the way she looks at Rahim and goes for a walk by himself. Seydoux follows him, while Rahim is splashing in the river with his mates, with the cooling towers in the distance. He watches as she catches up with Ménochet and insists that she cheated on him so they could be a proper family and begs him not to cancel the wedding. They kiss and Rahim is distraught and tries to block his windows so he can't hear the sound of love-making coming from Ménochet's caravan.

A short while later, the lid comes off a tub that Rahim is carrying and it spills over Gourmet's back. He manages to remain calm, even though he knows he is destined for an excruciating cleansing ritual. Rahim is surprised not to have been contaminated and checks his body in the mirror at home and wonders whether the money is really worth this much aggravation. Gourmet has reached a similar conclusion and he tells Ménochet that he is going to quit. He urges him not to delay much longer either, as he has already lost his wife and daughters because he was almost addicted to the danger of the job.

The next day, Seydoux tells Rahim that she is going ahead with the wedding and that Ménochet has accepted the baby as his own. She begs him not to hate her, but more bad news awaits him at the plant, as Berto fires him for stashing his monitor and warns him that he could already be over the permitted level. He asks her if Ménochet reported him, but she refuses to reveal her sources. Before he leaves, Rahim calls to pay off the remainder of his debt and Ménochet notices the look Rahim gives Seydoux as they pass each other for the last time.

Gourmet gets drunk on their wedding day and Lellouche wishes them well. But, as everyone celebrates, a red apple rolls off her table and drops into a narrow gully. It pours with rain that night and Rahim returns to the camp to implore Seydoux to leave with him. Furious at being disturbed on his wedding night and humiliated in front of his friends, Ménochet beats the living daylights out of Rahim as they roll around in the mud.

The following day, Seydoux wanders into a field of horses while still wearing her wedding dress. Rahim tries to get back into the plant, but he is stopped by security and urged to see the doctor and go home. As he leaves the changing room, he sees Seydoux. She chases after him and hugs him and begs him to forgive her because she was scared. Suddenly, the sirens start going off and they both know that something serious has happened when the seventh repetition rings out. As the film ends, Ménochet is seen riding the mechanical bull in slow motion.

The emphasis is also firmly on the romantic in Grand Central, Rebecca Zlotowski's follow-up to Belle Épine (2010), which reunites her with several cast members and also sees her exploring the dynamic within another close-knit community of outsiders. In her debut feature, the band were female motorcycle racers. But Zlotowski switches her attention this time to the unskilled workers detailed to carry out routine cleaning and maintenance work on a nuclear power station in the Rhône Valley. Making evocative use of an Austrian facility that was never active and shifting deftly between digital imagery for the industrial interiors and 35mm for the more quotidian sequences, Zlotowski generates plenty of dramatic tension and sexual frisson. But the melodramatic comparisons between the clandestine lovers and the plant's potential dangers prove as enervating as the mediocre characterisation and the forced efforts to turn this into a latterday Western.

As Tahar Rahim travels without a ticket on the train to Cruas, he has his pocket picked by Johan Libéreau, who is also hoping to be hired by the nuclear plant that has been advertising for workers to undertake risky, but well-paid menial work. The pair become fast friends after Rahim gets his own back on the rascally Libéreau and they hook up with his pal Nahuel Pérez Biscayart while their applications are being processed. While drinking in a bar, Rahim impresses plant veterans Olivier Gourmet and Denis Ménochet by riding a mechanical bull and they offer him a bunk at their camper site outside the perimeter.

Gourmet is a worrier and cautions Rahim to follow the rules to the letter, as the materials they handle are toxic and levels of contamination can build up terrifyingly quickly. Ménochet recognises something of himself in Rahim and lends him some money while he is taking his aptitude tests. As he needs a character reference, Rahim pays a visit to estranged sister Margot Faure, who has heard the scare stories about nuclear power and tries to persuade him to find another job. However, he returns to Cruas, where he already feels that Gourmet and Ménochet are more supportive than his real family.

As they drink in the bar that night, Rahim is astonished to be kissed by a striking blonde, who informs him that the sensation he has just experienced is what a dose of radiation feels like. She sits on Ménochet's knee and he introduces Léa Seydoux as his fiancée. The following morning, Rahim, Libéreau and Pérez Biscayart learn that they have been accepted and they collect their hard hats, safety clothing and doseometers. Gourmet supervises them as they don the equipment for the first time and makes sure they know about its safe disposal at the end of each shift and the need to take a thorough shower.

The trio are nervous on entering the main hub for the first time and the sense of foreboding is exacerbated by the sound of their breathing apparatus and the eerie silence that hangs over the cooling pools. They watch as Ménochet goes out to the core in a special suit to retrieve a dropped tool and the supervisor confides that few men can match his courage. Still on tenterhooks, the newcomers are taken to the laundry where Seydoux works and Rahim stares at her through a protective grille. Gourmet also shows them the machine that tests the levels of radiation on their hands and warns them never to look round if the alarm goes off behind them, as the person involved wouldn't want to be stared at with his livelihood and health in jeopardy.

On payday, Seydoux invites a friend to join the boys on an outing in a flashy open-top car. They drive into the country with loud rap blaring and Seydoux and Rahim leave the others to wander along the riverbank. Once out of sight, they begin kissing among the bulrushes. But Seydoux is back on Ménochet's knee that night, as they sit under the stars listening to Camille Lellouche singing an old pop song about the perils of love.

The following day, Gourmet is involved in a scare and Rahim watches two workers arguing furiously about who is to blame for the leak. He is relieved when Gourmet is released unharmed, but is stung when he receives a clip around the ear for his conduct over a bottle of water and Gourmet reminds him that they are a team and that any breaches reflect badly on him. Vowing to keep his head down and his nose clean, Rahim goes to Ménochet's caravan to pay back his loan. Seydoux answers the door and tells him that she loves her man and would never dream of hurting him. Rahim nods, but they end up kissing passionately again that evening and they renew their vow to do the right thing by their mutual friend.

Some time later, Rahim and Libéreau are sent to repair a leak on an upper level and have to use climbing harnesses to reach the spot. However, they fail to complete the task in the allotted time and the pair are furious with each other as they drive home. Unable to sleep, Rahim goes for a walk and bumps into Seydoux smoking in the yard. He follows at a distance as she wanders along the riverbank and waits for him in a boat at the end of the jetty. They slip the mooring and find a quiet spot to make love. As she undresses, Seydoux goes to say something, but stops herself.

Despite taking the utmost care to avoid detection, Seydoux is spotted returning from one of her walks by Ménochet, who wonders where she has been. Rahim and his pals go to the zoo to look at the crocodiles and enjoy the freedom that a little money has afforded them. However, their work remains dangerous and Rahim risks his own safety to assist Ménochet when his oxygen line becomes entangled while they are operating pressurised water jets. He is applauded by his workmates. But, in biting through his pressure suit to allow Ménochet to breathe, Rahim also exposed him to the toxic atmosphere and receives a sizeable dose himself.

Doctor Nozha Khouadra informs Rahim that he has absorbed close to his limit and has him transferred to the green zone so he can keep working. He takes extra precautions to scrub up after each shift. But he doesn't take as much care with Seydoux and Khouadra not only breaks the news that she is pregnant, but also that she will have some explaining to do, as Ménochet has long been impotent through working at the plant. Seydoux conceals the truth from Rahim and they spend an idyllic afternoon together lying naked in the long grass. A siren blares out from the plant and she explains that the number of repeats denotes the severity of the emergency.

They get back to find Lellouche has had her hair shaved because she has been exposed and she begs Seydoux to put on her wedding dress to cheer her up and show daughter Kessy Magnary how beautiful she is going to be. However, health and safety officer Marie Berto comes to the camp and accuses Gourmet of letting standards slip. He counters by charging the company with hiring unskilled labour to cut costs and the simmering tension leads Rahim and Libéreau to fall out, with the latter threatening to tell Ménochet about the affair if the former reports the fact that he has been bending the rules by hiding his doseometer outside the core area to avoid giving accurate readings.

Anxious about Ménochet finding out about the baby and still not sure how to tell Rahim, Seydoux misses their next assignation. But, when they go for a group picnic, Ménochet notices the way she looks at Rahim and goes for a walk by himself. Seydoux follows him, while Rahim is splashing in the river with his mates, with the cooling towers looming large behind them. He watches as Seydoux catches up with Ménochet and insists that she only cheated on him so that they could become a proper family and begs him not to cancel the wedding. They kiss and Rahim is distraught and, that night, he tries to block his windows so he can't hear the sound of love-making coming from Ménochet's caravan.

A short while later, the lid comes off a tub that Rahim is carrying and its contents spill over Gourmet's back. He manages to remain calm, even though he knows he is destined for an excruciating cleansing ritual. Rahim is surprised not to have been contaminated and checks his body in the mirror at home and wonders whether the money is really worth this much aggravation. Gourmet has reached a similar conclusion and he tells Ménochet that he is going to quit. He urges him not to delay much longer either, as he has already lost his wife and daughters because he was almost addicted to the danger of the job.

The next day, Seydoux tells Rahim that she is going ahead with the wedding and that Ménochet has accepted the baby as his own. She begs him not to hate her, but more bad news awaits him at the plant, as Berto fires him for stashing his monitor and warns him that he could already be over the permitted level. He asks her if Ménochet reported him, but she refuses to reveal her sources. Before he leaves, Rahim calls to pay off the remainder of his debt and Ménochet notices the look that Rahim gives Seydoux as they pass each other.

Gourmet gets drunk on their wedding day and Lellouche wishes them well. But, as everyone celebrates, a red apple rolls off the table and drops into a narrow gully. It pours with rain that night and Rahim returns to the camp to implore Seydoux to leave with him. Furious at being disturbed on his wedding night and humiliated in front of his friends, Ménochet beats the living daylights out of Rahim as they roll around in the mud.

The following day, Seydoux wanders into a field of horses while still wearing her wedding dress. Rahim tries to get back into the plant, but he is stopped by security and urged to see the doctor. As he leaves the changing room, he sees Seydoux. She chases after him and hugs him and implores him to forgive her because she was scared. Suddenly, the siren goes off and they both know that something serious has happened when the seventh repetition rings out. As the film ends, Ménochet is seen riding the mechanical bull in slow motion and the audience is invited to speculate whether he has ended up alone.

Although the plot throws up numerous socio-political issues, Zlotowski and co-scenarist Gaëlle Macé always seem more interested in the ménage than the debates surrounding nuclear power. There are a few Loachian moments, most notably as Berto and Gourmet bicker over safety concerns and the exploitation of cheap, disposable labour. The sequences inside the reactor also disconcert in highlighting the precarious nature of the operation and the extent to which it can be catastrophically compromised by human error.

But this is not a message movie. Instead, it's an old-fashioned melodrama about a woman being tempted by a handsome newcomer to stray from the decent older fellow who has always protected her. Given Zlotowski's gender, this is a surprisingly reductive theme and she compounds her somewhat chauvinist approach by frequently depicting Seydoux in various states of undress without once exploring the nature or significance of her employment. Nevertheless, Seydoux invests her sketchy character with a modicum of personality and she sparks well with Rahim without ever quite convincing that theirs is a life-changing passion. As always, the charismatic Rahim is imposingly intense. But we learn little about the circumstances that make such a hazardous job seem worth the risk and it is only as Gourmet is about to leave the camp that anything is revealed about his fraught background.

Perhaps more thought might to have gone into these aspects of the picture instead of the rather self-conscious homages to the poetic realism of Jean Renoir and Jacques Becker. However, the technical side can't be faulted, with Georges Lechaptois's photography and Antoine Platteau's production design contrasting the sterile austerity of the plant with the shambolic cosiness of the camp. But even more impressive are Cédric Deloche's ethereal sound design and the pulsatingly spiky score by techno artist Robin Coudert, which blends pounding rhythms and discordant jazz riffs with a confidence and inventiveness that exceeds anything in the storyline.

Courtesy of Sweet Sue and Her Society Syncopators, a more traditional brand of ragtime provides the soundtrack for Billy Wilder's Some Like It Hot (1959), which has been dusted down for reissue to mark its 65th anniversary. Regarded by many as the finest comedy of the sound era, this is a picture that needs little introduction. It was scripted by Wilder and IAL Diamond, who borrowed liberally from Kurt Hoffmann's German musical comedy, Fanfares of Love (1951). But, while the passing decades have done little to blunt its verbal edge, this is no longer as subversive as it was in the twilight of the Eisenhower presidency, when the Production Code still dictated what Hollywood film-makers could and could not say. Nevertheless, Wilder's mischievous direction and the impeccable performances of the leading quartet ensure that it remains a delight and one hopes that it will long continue to be ranked among those untouchable pictures that Tinseltown would never dare to remake.

Although the Stock Market has yet to crash, times have been tough for saxophonist Joe (Tony Curtis) and bull fiddle player Jerry (Jack Lemmon) and they are relieved to be playing at the illegal speakeasy that mobster `Spats' Colombo (George Raft) has set up behind the Mozarella Funeral Parlour in Chicago. However, Detective Mulligan (Pat O'Brien) raids the premises in February 1929 and Jerry and Joe manage to sneak away with their instruments as Spats vows vengeance on those who betrayed him.

Suddenly unemployed again, the duo drop into Sig Poliakoff's Bands for All Occasions Placement Agency, where the boss (Billy Gray) has nothing for them. However, secretary Nellie Weinmeyer (Barbara Drew) has not forgiven Joe for standing her up on a date, so she offers them on to a three-week tour of Florida with an all-girl band. Jerry is quite prepared to drag up and accept the gig, but Joe insists they take the St Valentine's Dance at the University of Illinois instead. In order to get to the campus at Urbana, they arrange to borrow Nellie's car. But they arrive at the garage just as Spats is exacting his revenge on snitch Toothpick Charlie (George E. Stone) and he spots them cowering in a corner.

They somehow manage to slip away and call Sig to accept the Florida booking and arrive on the platform as Josephine and Daphne to join Sweet Sue (Joan Shawlee) and Her Society Syncopators. The band's manager, Beinstock (Dave Barry), gives them a guarded welcome as he is fretting that ukulele player Sugar Kane Kowalczyk (Marilyn Monroe) is late again. She teeters up on her impossibly high heels and Josephine and Daphne struggle to contain their inner man as they watch her approach. But Jerry is more committed to the lie than Joe and urges him to keep his head or they won't live long enough to regret it.

On board the train, Daphne and Josephine befriend Sugar after she drops her hip flask while crooning `Runnin' Wild' during a rehearsal session and Daphne takes the blame before Sue can fire Sugar for drinking on the job. As they settle down for the night in the sleeping car, Sugar jumps on to Daphne's bunk and thanks her for keeping Sue off her back. An impromptu party breaks out and Sugar chats to Josephine in the washroom about her bad luck with saxophonists who seduce her before breaking her heart. She confides that she would prefer to fall in love with a rich man in glasses and Josephine promises to help her find one.

Arriving at the Seminole-Ritz Hotel in Miami, Daphne catches the eye of oil magnate Osgood Fielding III (Joe E. Brown), who pinches her bottom in the elevator while helping carry her luggage. Once they are safely ensconced in their room, Jerry concedes that he finally has an idea of what women go through. But he is glad that they can end the charade and find work with a male band. However, Joe insists they are better remaining in disguise until they know that Spats is not on their tail and Jerry tuts because he knows that Joe is only keen on staying with Sweet Sue so he can make a move on Sugar.

That afternoon, Josephine slips away while Sugar is sunning herself on the beach and returns wearing glasses and sailing togs stolen from Beinstock. He introduces himself as Junior, the heir to Shell Oil, and Sugar is instantly smitten, as he boasts about the size of his yacht. She tells him she is a jazz musician and informs him that she studied at the Sheboygan Conservatory when he sneers that, unlike those who like it hot, he only likes classical music.

Daphne, however, recognises Joe and urges Sugar to rush back to the hotel to tell Josephine all about her meeting. Presuming that Jerry would try to expose him, Joe rushes back to the room and just about gets Josephine's wig on before plunging into a bubble bath. He urges Sugar to be careful with millionaires and then begs Jerry to keep Osgood occupied for the evening so he can entertain Sugar on his yacht. Reluctantly, Jerry agrees and after the show (during which Sugar sings `I Wanna Be Loved By You') he takes Osgood dancing so that Junior can have some privacy with Sugar. He informs her that deep psychological scarring has left him unable to feel anything when he kisses and Sugar tries her level best to restore some sensation.

Meanwhile, Osgood and Daphne spend the night dancing the tango and, when they meet up again next morning, Joe is appalled to discover that Jerry has accepted his marriage proposal so that he can enjoy financial security after the divorce settlement. When Joe points out that Jerry can't actually marry Osgood, he stops shaking his maracas and reminds himself that he is a boy. This realisation, however, coincides with the arrival of Spats for the 10th Annual Friends of Italian Opera convention, which is also being monitored by Mulligan, who has followed Spats south, as he suspects him of ordering the St Valentine's Day Massacre.

Desperate to avoid detection, Joe and Jerry agree to sell the diamond necklace that Osgood has given Daphne. But Joe sends it to Sugar in a box of white orchids as a parting gift from Junior, who calls to say that he has been forced into an arranged union with the daughter of a Venezuelan tycoon. Sugar rushes into their room in search of Bourbon and Joe is dismayed by the pain he has caused her. However, he knows they have to flee and Josephine and Daphne climb down the outside of the hotel carrying their instruments.

They are spotted by some of Spats's goons, just as he is being taken to task by South Side boss Little Bonaparte (Nehemiah Persoff) for disturbing the peace by eliminating Toothpick Charlie. However, he insists he bears no grudges and has a giant birthday cake wheeled to the table. Unfortunately for Spats, it contains Johnny Paradise (Edward G. Robinson, Jr.), who mows him down with a machine-gun before he is arrested by the swooping Mulligan.

As they try to evade gangsters in the foyer, Josephine and Daphne see Sugar singing `I'm Through With Love' in the ballroom and Joe can't resist rushing up to kiss her. She recognises Junior's lips and is amazed to discover that they belong to Josephine. As they ride in Osgood's motor launch to his yacht, Joe explains that Sugar has fallen for another sax player. But she doesn't care and Osgood is equally indifferent when Jerry reveals that he's a man, for, as Osgood  concludes, `nobody's perfect'.

Coined by Diamond on the night before the scene was filmed, this has become the most celebrated closing line in screen history. But there is so much to admire about this cross-dressing screwball, including Orry-Kelly's Oscar-winning costumes. More memorable, however, are the decidedly risqué double entendres that aroused the ire of the Catholic Legion of Decency and the in-jokes involving Cary Grant's accent and Marilyn Monroe's stint at the Actors Studio. There are also countless references to old gangster movies, with George Raft mocking Edward G. Robinson, Jr. for flipping a coin (as he had done in Howard Hawks's Scarface, 1932) and pushing a grapefruit into Mike Mazurki's mush in much the same manner that James Cagney had done to Mae Clarke in William A. Wellman's The Public Enemy (1931).

Obviously, the performances are above reproach and it is fervently to be hoped that the rumours that Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law are keen to reprise the roles of Josephine and Daphne never get louder than a whisper. The scenario has been reworked once before, by Narender Bedi, whose Bollywood masala, Rafoo Chakkar (1975), starred Rishi Kapoor and Kanwarjit Paintal as the fugitives and Neetu Singh as the chanteuse who always gets the fuzzy end of the lollipop. But it would be such a shame if an unworthy reboot was ever attempted Stateside, as the original can simply never be bettered.

Back in the early 1950s, Marilyn Monroe was still struggling to establish herself when a New York nanny started taking photographs in her spare time. Over the next few decades, she would amass somewhere in the region of 150,000 negatives and they remained hidden in boxes until Chicago historian John Maloof happened to stumble across them while searching for illustrations for a book. He scanned some of the better images and posted them online and such was the response that he decided to find out more about the photographer. He chronicled his journey on film with the help of Charlie Siskel. But, while it proves a fascinating detective story, Finding Vivian Maier also raises some troubling questions about the point at which artistic salvage becomes grave robbery.

In the winter of 2007, while researching a book about the Portage Park area of Chicago, John Maloof acquired some 30,000 photographic negatives at an auction. He paid $380 for them, but could find nothing immediately useful and stored the box in a cupboard. Two years later, he examined the contents more carefully and discovered that the images were surprisingly well composed. He scanned 200 of the best and posted them on a blog, while contacting local galleries to see if they would be interested in hosting an exhibition. But a Google search brought up nothing on the woman who had taken the pictures and Vivian Maier (Mayer, Meyer or Meyers) remained an enigma until Maloof found an obituary in the Chicago Tribune in April 2009.

A few months later, he loaded more images to Flickr and was overwhelmed by the positive response to street pictures that not only suggested that Maier had a wonderful eye, but also that she was a deeply compassionate observer of the contemporary social scene. Suitably inspired, Maloof began digging deeper and learned that Maier had spent many years working as a nanny across the United States and he used clues contained within the obituary and his stash of negatives to track down a family that had helped her pay the rent on a storage locker.

On opening this treasure trove, Maloof not only found Maier's personal effects, but also the ephemera that she had hoarded since the 1950s. Among the items he found were hundreds of rolls of unused colour and monochrome film stock, reels of home movies, dozens of audio cassette tapes, and masses of documents and souvenirs, as well as the Rolleiflex box camera that Maier has used for the majority of the photographs. Suspecting that he had stumbled upon a gold mine, Maloof returned to the auction house and bought the other boxes of negatives that had been sold off to meet Maier's default payments on the storage space.

Keen to have Maier's work seen by a larger audience, Maloof contacted the Museum of Modern Art in New York. However, MoMA wanted nothing to do with posthumous images and Maloof decided to hire a room at the Culture Centre in Chicago to mount a modest exhibition. Such was the enthusiastic turnout that Maier made local headlines and even started cropping up on national TV news bulletins as experts began to acclaim her as an undiscovered genius.

Apparently untainted by the snobbery of the artistic establishment, feted photographers Joel Meyerowitz and Mary Ellen Mark declared Maier to be a gifted artist, with the latter comparing her to Robert Frank, Lisette Model, Diane Arbus and Helen Levitt in declaring that she would have become famous if she had opted to show her work in her lifetime. This desire for anonymity, coupled with Maier's prolificity, intrigues Maloof and he sets out to find some of the people who had hired Maier and grown up under her tutelage. Much to his surprise, they number TV presenter Phil Donahue, who recalls Maier snapping away for much of the year she served as his housekeeper. He felt she was a little odd because she had a habit of photographing the contents of garbage cans, but the majority verdict among the former employers was that Maier was a mysterious eccentric, who fiercely guarded her privacy and hoarded everything from newspapers to bus tickets..

In a series of talking-head clips, Zalman and Laura Usiskin declare Maier unusual, while Roger Carlson comments upon her hats. Karen Frank and Jennifer Rofé remember her being tall, while Jacqueline Bruni-Maniér and Cathy Bruni-Norris join Judy and Chuck Swisher in recalling her unflattering clothes and heavy boots. Ginger Tam reflects upon her austere hairstyle, while Duffy Levant suggests that she looked like a cross between a Soviet factory worker and the Wicked Witch of the West. His sister Jennifer, however, places her emphasis on the omnipresent camera and Barry Wallis concedes that he was always rather envious of Maier's box Rolleiflex.

Meyerowitz explains that this was something of a secretive camera as it shot from below and people weren't always aware that they were being photographed. Moreover, the lower angle tended to give subjects a power and dignity that was not always readily apparent in their daily circumstances. He commends Maier for having the gregariousness to coax certain sitters and the stealth to remain invisible to others. Carole Pohn concurs that Maier was a difficult person to read and joins with Maren Baylaender and Bill Sacco in remembering both her refusal to let anyone get too close and her insistence on a lockable door as part of her terms of employment. Pohn smiles sadly that her friend was so furtive and laments that she didn't live to see her achievement recognised. She also wonders how galling it must have felt to have been a domestic servant while concealing such a talent.

Now thoroughly hooked, Maloof travels to Southampton in New York state, where Maier took the earliest pictures in the collection at Tide's End in 1951. Laura Walker shows him round what used to be her grandparents' place and she is distressed by its poor state of repair. She recalls that Maier was with them for the summer, but Pohn got to know her much better after they first met in Highland Park in 1962. As she recalls how good Maier was with children, Maloof shows 8mm clips of her playing with her charges, while extracts from the cassettes suggest the easy affection they had for her. Baylaender avers that she made each day an adventure and Linda Matthews and offspring Joe and Sarah Matthews-Ludington remember her treating them to free candy samples at every store in town. However, Joe resented being made to wait around while Maier took her photographs and the Levants recall how she took pictures when their brother fell off his bike rather than summoning medical assistance.

By now, Maloof has convinced himself that Maier is a pioneering citizen journalist and he plays clips of her asking supermarket customers about Watergate and shows the footage she recorded while investigating an infamous 1972 mother and baby murder case. Yet, he is no closer to knowing anything about Maier herself. John Perbohner and Barry Wallis argue about the authenticity of her French accent, while shopkeeper Bindy Bitterman complains that Maier was a difficult customer who was reluctant to leave contact details whenever she ordered anything. Wallis concurs that Maier often used the name Smith to cover her tracks and he wonders whether she lived a Mittyeseque existence, as she had once informed him that she was a spy.

The Usiskins posit that Maier was a highly intelligent woman whose sympathy for the lower classes made her look down on her bourgeois employers. But, having once worked in a sweatshop, it's likely that she became a nanny because it offered her security and the freedom to do what she wanted, even if this meant taking off for eight months in 1959 to travel through Asia, Africa and Latin America. Maloof presents a sample of the thousands of images she took on her world tour, but Duffy Levant and Carole Pohn doubt whether Maier would have wanted her pictures to be seen. Some share their concerns, while others avow that Maier would probably have wanted the work recognised on the proviso that she could remain in the shadows.

Yet, Maloof springs a surprise that calls into question just how well those who met Maier actually knew her. With the aid of genealogist Michael Strauss, Maloof discovers that Maier was born to an Austrian father (Charles) and a French mother (Maria) on 1 February 1926. But her birthplace was New York rather than Europe and Strauss admits that her parents and older brother proved so secretive that he has struggled to uncover tangible information about them. He did, however, discover that an aunt who died in 1965 left everything to a friend rather than her surviving niece.

On returning to the photo archive, Maloof realises that some of the pictures taken in France predate the 1959 odyssey and he starts comparing the steeples of village churches online. After much painstakinng research, he discovers a connection with the Alpine community of Saint-Bonnet-en-Champsaur and, ignoring the misgivings of some of Maier's more protective charges, he goes to meet mayor Daniel Arnaud in the neighbouring hamlet of Saint Julien. He points Maloof in the direction of Sylvain Jussaud, who turns out to be a cousin who possesses family snaps featuring the young Vivian. Much to Maloof's amazement, he also produces her mother Maria's camera and he forges another link in the chain when he tracks down the son of Simon Philippe, who had printed some of Maier's landscapes to sell as postcards in the late 1940s.

Maloof is particularly excited by this revelation, as it demonstrates that Maier was aware of the quality of her work and that she had once tried to profit from it. He notes her attention to the calibre of the paper and the gloss finish that Philippe had used and recognises that he has a duty to find the best laboratory to expose and print images that she had never seen herself. Yet, even though she had made no subsequent effort to develop, let alone market her pictures, Maloof convinces himself that his discovery justifies his endeavour to showcase Maier's work.

To this end, he enlists the help of gallery owner Howard Greenberg, who explains that the art establishment is reluctant to handle posthumous negatives, as a danger is always present during the developing and printing processes of imposing an interpretation that the artist may not have intended. Citing the examples of the late Garry Winogrand and Eugène Atget, Maloof dismisses this thesis out of hand and further claims that Henri Carter-Bresson and Robert Frank played little or no supervisory role in the printing of their work. However, while he protests that he wishes that Maier was alive so that she could enjoy the financial rewards of her brilliance, Maloof struggles conclusively to counter the arguments of the artistic hierarchy for which he clearly has such little respect.

But Maloof also disregards the advice of some of Maier's friends and acquaintances by embarking upon the commercialisation of images she had guarded to the grave and he further risks their ire by proceeding to probe the darker recesses of her character. He travels to Little Falls, Minnesota to meet Inger Raymond, who had Maier as a governess between the ages of five and eleven during the period 1967-74. Raymond's best friend was Jennifer Lavant and they both recall `Miss Maier' taking them on walks through the rougher parts of town so that she could capture the most evocative images. However, while Inger insists that Maier always caught people unawares, Lavant claims that she used to pose them and that some felt exploited.

Linda Matthews recalls how Maier used to hoard copies of the New York Times and clip stories that exposed human folly. She also opines (as Maloof shows a shocking image of a horse lying dead in the gutter after seemingly having been shot in the head) that some of her pictures also focused on the less appealing aspects of human nature. Her daughter Sarah remembers Maier chipping away at her confidence and becomes highly animated in relating an anecdote about Maier washing her collection of glass tchotchkes in a strong solution of ammonia. She also insists that Maier struggled to cope whenever her brother Joe acted up and recalls one occasion when Maier left her in an alleyway to pursue a picture and she had to be brought home by the cops.

Sarah also insists that there were numerous accidents that were nothing of the sort and Joe declares that Maier used to try and intimidate them into behaving with scary stories about children being abused. Raymond believes she had a phobia about men and remembers Maier drumming into her that they only wanted one thing and couldn't be trusted. Jennifer Lavant speculates about whether Maier was molested as a girl and whether this might have affected her attitude to men. Raymond remembers Maier once hitting a chap who tried to prevent her from falling over, but her own recollections have clearly been coloured by the fact that Maier used to force feed her and choke her to ensure she swallowed her food. She would also lose her temper and inflict physical violence upon her by swinging her round by her wrists or slamming her head into bookcases. Thus, while Raymond is ready to concede that Maier might have been an exceptional artist, she has no doubt that could also be cruel.

Jennifer Lavant takes Maloof to the Raymond house and they enter the room that Maier used to occupy. She shows him the dip in the floor where the weight of her stored newspapers had bowed the floorboards. Linda Matthews admits to being amazed by the ceiling-high piles of papers that she had found when she ventured into Maier's quarters and recalls having to squeeze along the narrow gaps she left between them. She has no idea why Maier kept papers dating back years. But Roger Carlson recalls that she used to rig books on her desk so that she would know if anyone had been snooping.

Joe and Sarah are adamant that Maier was suffering from a mental illness by the end of her stay with the Matthews family. Linda remembers having to dismiss her after she threw a tantrum because some of her papers had been given to a neighbour to cover his floor while he decorated. Yet, she regained her composure the moment that Linda fired her and calmly requested two months' notice and her pay in advance. Linda still doesn't know whether she knew what to say because this had often happened to her in the past or whether she knew that she had overstepped the mark and was ready for the bad news when it came. She gets tearful, as she admits that the whole family had missed her. But she also has little sympathy with her, as she feels she treated Maier well and that she had refused to smooth off the rough edges that would have enabled her to fit in.

According to Judy Swisher, Maier remained idiosyncratic into the late 1990s, as she had refused to co-operate with the estate agency when they decided to sell her elderly mother's house. Pohn recognised that Maier was suffering when they met for the last time in 2002. She was desperate for Pohn to stop and talk, but she was taking her grandchildren to Rogers Beach and couldn't linger. She regrets that she let her down and Maloof wanders around the neighbourhood asking if anyone remembers Maier. A unidentified woman claims she was someone to steer clear of, while a middle-aged man (with the most peculiar facial hair in recent screen history) recalls her being something of a dumpster diver.

He is surprised that the quirky old biddy he knew is a great artist, but he is glad to have known her. His companions remember how Maier had resisted getting into the ambulance after she had fallen in the park and they regret never having seen her again. Inger Raymond harks back to the times that Maier used to take her to the stockyards to photograph the sheep being herded towards their doom. As Maloof shows home-movie footage of Raymond in a red coat watching the hapless creatures being controlled with a stick, she realises that this had been her first brush with death. But she was also suitably touched by what she witnessed to start keeping sheep herself.

A montage follows of old people captured by Maier's lens before Pohn reveals that Maier was buried near the place where she used to take the children hunting for wild strawberries. Meyerowitz claims that it's obvious that Maier was a nanny because there is an unmissable tenderness and watchfulness in her pictures. However, he regrets that she lacked the courage to defend her achievement and questions whether she had an artistic soul, as it takes a certain kind of personality to submit work for public scrutiny. Greenberg states that her posthumous success reflects very badly on those who had the temerity to reject her, while actor Tim Roth waxes lyrical about the particular picture he bought.

Back in St Julien, the locals delight in recognising themselves and their loved ones in Maier's images. Mayerowitz applauds her ability to get people to be themselves in their own space, while the Matthews siblings concur that it was probably best that the fuss erupted after Maier died, as she would have hated it. Yet, Maloof concedes as his journey ends that he still doesn't understand why Maier took so many pictures while wishing to remain so anonymous

This is not the only time that the cinematic spotlight has fallen on Maier, as Jill Nicholls was producing Vivian Maier: Who Took Nanny's Pictures around the same time that Siskel was collaborating with Maloof. Clearly, this is more of an insider's account. But it is, therefore, more prone to the kind of problems that come with official status, especially as Maloof so evidently feels the need to defend himself against accusations of cashing in on Maier's legacy.
Working in conjunction with editor Aaron Wickenden, Maloof and Siskel have made effective use of the moving and still imagery in the Maier archive to fashion a compelling detective story. It's not always clear why some of the talking heads are present (or what qualifies them to make such definitively dire pronouncements) and the contradictions in their testimony are often allowed to stand unchallenged. This is puzzling, as such clashes undermine the reliability of the evidence rather than deepen the mystery. It is also troubling that so many damning revelations are presented without corroboration and that so many suppositions are deemed conclusive. Maier was clearly a tormented soul, but her reputation as a human being is as thoroughly trashed here as her reputation as an artist is vaunted.

Many will question whether Maloof's dominion over Maier's artwork entitles him to such proprietorial control over her biography, personality and memory. Others will also wonder why Maloof so scrupulously avoids discussing the responsibilities attendant on assuming the ownership of somebody else's creativity. It's interesting to note that the stamp authenticating Maier's prints contain Maloof's name and there are moments when this feels as much like an infomercial as a documentary.

More might have been made of the fact that the cyber community made Maier a star. Maloof might also have explored what this says about viral culture and where it leaves the art elite that tried to deny Maier her critical due. Thus, while one should be grateful for the fact that we now have access to so many poignant, poetic and politically charged photographs, the nagging doubt remains that Maloof has gone about this eminently worthwhile enterprise in entirely the wrong way.

A markedly different kind of eccentric is profiled by Jeffrey Schwarz in I Am Divine, which traces the evolution of one of the most colourful and gleefully outrageous characters on the American countercultural scene in the 1970s and 80s. Stuffed with riotous clips from a range of cult classics and wittily trenchant insights from those who knew Divine at the peak of his powers, this is a fitting tribute that largely avoids eulogies and sentimentality. However, it doesn't always succeed in placing the gross-out diva in his wider socio-cultural context or in explaining why he never quite managed to break out into the mainstream.

Harris Glenn Milstead was born to a Baltimore plumber and his Yugoslavian wife on 19 October 1945. The only child of parents hailing from families of seven and 15 respectively, Glenn was spoilt rotten and ballooned as a consequence. His mother Frances (who died in 2009, but crops up regularly throughout the documentary) recalls him being bullied at school, but insists that he had the solid Baptist faith and sound common sense to keep his head down. Despite having Diane Evans as his girlfriend at school, Glenn discovered he was bisexual after being sent to a psychiatrist when he was 17. The following year, he began studying hairdressing at the Marinella Beauty School, but his burgeoning friendships with actor David Lochary and aspiring film director John Waters changed his life forever.

Although Waters had grown up in the same Lutherville suburb, he knew nothing about Milstead until they started experimenting with drink and drugs at a beatnik bar called Mardick's. It was Waters who gave Milstead his nickname and starred him as a smoking nun in his second movie, a Warhol-cum-Anger pastiche entitled Roman Candles (1966). Appearing alongside him were such fellow members of the Dreamlanders cabal as Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce and Mink Stole and the first two reunited with Divine in Eat Your Makeup (1968), in which he played a grotesque version of former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, who abducted various young people and forced them to model themselves to death.

But Divine contributed an even more garish caricature to The Diane Linkletter Story (1969), which mockingly recreated the supposed LSD-induced suicide of the 20 year-old daughter of TV personality Art Linkletter. Few got to see this unholy trio, but Waters's feature debut, Mondo Trasho (1970), made the local papers after the director was arrested for filming a scene of public nudity. Divine had to settle for a supporting role, as a motorist who runs over Pearce's provocative blonde bombshell. But he was back front and centre in Multiple Maniacs (1970), as the owner of an exhibit branded The Cavalcade of Perversions who got to masturbate with a rosary in a church and consume her murdered boyfriend's heart before being raped by a giant lobster.

Away from Waters's films, Divine was going through something of a crisis. Having quit hairdressing, he opened a clothing store, only for it to lose money and he fled to San Francisco to explore his sexual identity. He returned to take the lead in Pink Flamingos (1971), in which he sported a new barnet after Van Smith shaved his hairline to make more room for his outrageous eye make-up. Moreover, Divine carved himself a niche in cult infamy by eating dog faeces in a finale that earned the picture bookings across America. But his new-found celebrity went to his head and, following a row over his car, he stormed out on the parents who had offered him unstinting support without knowing anything of his alternative lifestyle. He didn't speak to them again for nine years and never included a forwarding address on the postcards he periodically sent them and made no effort to contact them after they moved to Florida to ease father Harris's muscular dystrophy.

Such was Divine's growing fame that he and Mink Stole were invited to join The Cockettes, a Frisco-based drag troupe that staged such revue skits as Divine and Her Stimulating Studs and Divine Saves the World. But, even though he relocated to California in the early 1970s, he returned to Baltimore for Female Trouble (1974), in which he played teenage tearaway Dawn Davenport, who ends up in the electric chair for pursuing her conviction that crime is art. However, Divine also doubled up as Dawn's lover, Earl Peterson, which particularly pleased him, as he was wary of becoming typecast as a female impersonator. That said, he opted to play Pauline, the prison matron in Tom Eyen's stage comedy, Women Behind Bars, rather than hook up with Waters on Desperate Living (1977) and he also found himself appearing in Richard Gayer's documentary, Alternative Miss World, when he followed the production to London.

Divine and Eyen reteamed on The Neon Woman and he became a familiar figure on the Studio 54 scene. But he remained loyal to Waters and forged a new friendship with Tab Hunter when they played Francine Fishpaw and Todd Tomorrow in the scratch`n'sniff extravaganza, Polyester (1981). More importantly, Divine patched things up with Frances, who had learned about his alter ego from a Life magazine article on Waters. Divine called her after she sent a note through a mutual friend and he tried to reassure her that he was doing well by bringing her lavish gifts. But he was actually in debt and on the point of reinventing himself as a disco icon. His early outings sold well enough, but he was swindled out of his share of the profits and only tasted real success with `You Think You're a Man' and `I'm So Beautiful', which were produced by Pete Waterman.

In 1985, Divine returned to the big screen to renew his partnership with Tab Hunter in Paul Bartel's camp Western, Lust in the Dust. He impressed more, however, as ruthless gangster Hilly Blue in Alan Rudolph's neo-noir, Trouble in Mind. The role had been written for him and Divine rose to its challenges. But fans and critics alike were reluctant to accept him as anything other than John Waters's creation and the pair joined forces for the final time on Hairspray (1988). Once again, Divine took two roles - slovenly housewife Edna Turnblad and racist TV chief Arvin Hodgepile - and was slightly disappointed not to have been cast as Edna's plump daughter, Tracy. However, the role went to Ricki Lake, who has nothing but fond memories of working with Divine and the pleasure that Frances derived from attending the premieres in Miami and Baltimore with her son.

But the 42 year-old Divine would only make one more picture, Michael Schroeder's Out of the Dark, which was released after his death on 7 March 1988. He was staying in a Los Angeles hotel prior to filming a guest spot in Married With Children when he suffered a cardiac arrest in his sleep. Waters regrets that he passed just as he was starting to enjoy himself, but manager Bernard Jay insists that Divine died of happiness, as he had found acceptance, caring confidantes, handsome lovers and famous friends like Andy Warhol, who had wanted to paint him.

There's no question that this affection lives on, as this is one of the sweetest biodocs of recent times. Schwarz makes no excuses for Divine's lapses in judgement and taste, but he also puts a necessary distance between the personas of `the filthiest person alive' and the momma's boy who lost his way and was never quite sure how to get back home. For all the subversion and obscenity, there was also plenty of loneliness and self-doubt.

There also appeared to be a lack of self-control, as Divine not only abused his body with food and drugs, but he also spent beyond his means and it is desperately sad to learn that many of his belongings were confiscated and sold to pay his tax arrears. Yet, while Schwarz has a firm grasp on the man and the myth, he fails to address is the impact that Divine had on the wider gay scene and how his success influenced the debate on such issues as body image.

If Divine had his devotees, the subject of Mike Myers's documentary debut doesn't appear to have an enemy in the world. Indeed, Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon is a bromantic valentine to an entertainment legend who could party as hard as any of his clients and still be sufficiently compos mentis to clear up any collateral damage the next morning. Some big names fall over themselves to pay tribute amidst the splendidly chosen archive clips. But, while this is a largely uncritical appreciation, it also makes no secret of its subjectivity and is all the more enjoyable for its gossipy indiscretion and genuine affection.

Raised in Oceanside, New York and educated at SUNY in Buffalo, Ohio, Shep Gordon stumbled into show business in 1968 after Janis Joplin slapped him while he was staying in the Hollywood Landmark Motor Hotel. The following year, Gordon founded Alive Enterprises after Jimi Hendrix suggested that he should take up music management because he was Jewish. Among his first clients were Pink Floyd, but they decided to look for alternative representation after nine days and Gordon found himself devoting his energies to boosting the career of Alice Cooper. Stung by his poor reception while supporting The Doors and barred from entering the venue where he was sharing the bill with Ike and Tina Turner, Cooper was beginning to think he was wasting his time when Gordon swept him back to his native Detroit and began fashioning the mix of rock, vaudeville, sex and violence that would make kids adore Alice as much as their parents detested him.

Reminiscing while lounging on a boat and strolling around a golf course, Cooper avers that his fortunes changed the night that Gordon tossed a live chicken on stage and his reputation for grizzly mayhem was enshrined. Over the years, Cooper would take shock rock to new extremes, as he performed in a straitjacket and plastic wrapping, posed with snakes and subjected himself to nightly executions by noose, guillotine and the electric chair. One critic described his act as `neo-Dadaist', but Cooper was just glad to keep churning out the hit singles and albums and playing to packed houses.

But, while Gordon revelled in the rock lifestyle, Cooper turned out to be something of an aberration among his clients. Also on his books were Groucho Marx, Raquel Welch, Blondie, Manhattan Transfer and Anne Murray. The latter proved a hard sell, as the music press found little to enthuse about in the Canadian's gentle brand of balladeering. However, her image was transformed in a trice when Gordon had her photographed alongside such Hollywood Vampires drinking buddies as John Lennon, Harry Nilsson and Mickey Dolenz. Gordon also plucked Teddy Pendergrass off the Chitlin' Circuit and promoted him as `the black Elvis'. Indeed, he reinvented him as a sex symbol by having him play `women only' shows. But Pendergrass's moment in the spotlight was short-lived, as he was left paraplegic after a car crash and it took all of Gordon's powers of persuasion to coax him into making an emotional comeback singing `Reach Out and Touch' with Ashford and Simpson at LiveAid.

Gordon's acts were selling tens of millions of albums when he decided to change tack and enter the world of films. He got off to an auspicious start with Ridley Scott's The Duellists (1977), which landed an award at Cannes, and he used the leverage to form Island Alive with Chris Blackwell, the chief of Island Records. In 1985, William Hurt followed the Best Actor prize at Cannes with the Academy Award for his performance in Hector Babenco's Kiss of the Spider Woman and Gordon would go on to produce or distribute films by Lindsay Anderson, Alan Rudolph, John Carpenter, Wes Craven and Sam Shepard. He also befriended the likes of Michael Douglas, Sylvester Stallone and Tom Arnold, who extol the virtues of a loyal friend and a legendary ladies' man, who counted Sharon Stone among his lovers.

However, Gordon proves highly discreet in resisting the temptation to kiss and tell (although one suspects he is sufficiently self-aware to realise that he might not always emerge from closer scrutiny in this department with massive amounts of credit). Agent Carolyn Pfeiffer recalls his kindness when she lost her child and Gordon's cousin Patty and assistant Nancy Meola are quick to join the likes of Mick Fleetwood, Sammy Hagar, Fab Five Freddy and Willie Nelson in lauding his hospitality and generosity. Myers himself relates an anecdote about meeting Gordon while negotiating a deal to use Alice Cooper's `School's Out' in Wayne's World (1992) and reveals that he later helped him through a low period by letting him stay at his house on Mau for two months.

Further proof of Gordon's philanthropy is provided by his involvement with four orphaned children. When he was 27, Gordon went on a blind date with African-American model Winona Williams. They got along famously and Gordon doted on her eight year-old daughter, Mia. Even after he split up with Williams, he continued to pay for Mia's education and was devastated to learn in 1991 that she had died from her drug habit. Without hesitation, Gordon stepped in to prevent Mia's four children - Monique (nine), Chase (six), Amber (three) and baby Keira - from being fostered out and bought Williams a five-bedroom house in upstate New York to keep the family together. Chase, Amber and Keira testify to the debt they owe Gordon, who admits that surprised himself by being able to invest emotionally, as well as financially, in their well-being.

NBA coach Don Nelson concurs that Gordon is a peerless pal and we learn that he issues coupons to remind him to pay back favours. At one point, Gordon shared a cat named The Sensitive One with Cary Grant, while he also got to make yak butter tea for the Dalai Lama through his involvement with the Tibet Fund. But, while he retained a few favourite clients, the novelty of the bright lights was beginning to wear off. Through his friendship with Emeril Lagrasse and Dean Fearing, Gordon, however, became increasingly intrigued by cookery. He was particularly taken by the philosophy of nouvelle cuisine maestro Roger Vergé, who convinced him to abandon the misery he consistently witnessed in the music business and do something that made him genuinely happy.

On learning that Vergé was not allowed to eat in top-end restaurants because he was classed as a domestic servant, Gordon set about inventing the `celebrity chef' and used television and product sponsorship to turn the likes of Vergé and Lagrasse into household names. In the process, he met and married raw food specialist Renee Loux. But they drifted apart after discovering that they couldn't have children and Gordon began to spend more of his time alone on Mau. In 2012, he suffered a small intestine trauma and underwent an operation that had only a 20% survival chance. Consequently, Gordon was able to take in his stride the fact that Pendergrass wrote him out of his autobiography and he continues to enjoy the good life with those who matter to him.

Considering the lengths to which he has gone to secure fame and fortune for his clients, there is a sad irony in the fact that Gordon no longer believes that celebrity has any intrinsic value. But this is never a study in regret, and, even though Meyers rather gallantly glosses over his evidently chequered love life, Gordon is prepared to stand by his mistakes and apologise for those he cannot laugh about. Abetted by cinematographer Michael Pruitt-Bruun and editor Joseph Krings, Meyers makes adept use of exclusive and archival material and clearly has a gift for putting interview subjects at their ease and lulling them into divulging the good stuff. He sparks particularly well with Gordon, whose willingness to be the butt of his own jokes makes him all the more engaging. That said, he is evidently a man of contradictions and one suspects that a far less flattering account of his wheeler-dealings could be produced by some of those outside his charmed inner circle. But the man who emerges here clearly seems to deserve his `supermensch' moniker.