Those who saw Hollywood's courtroom shocker The Exorcism of Emily Rose can only view this German version of the same story more favourably.
Both films were inspired by the case of Anneliese Michel, a student who died in 1976 after a series of attempted exorcisms. But Hans-Christian Schmid's version is sober and understated, making what is done to her in good faith all the more outrageous.
The performance of Sandra H¸ller as the quiet, ordinary Michaela, whose debilitating epilepsy forces her to take a year off school and worries her devout Catholic parents, even when she is well enough to go to university, won her the Best Actress Bear at the Berlin Festival.
It was a just award since there is no over-playing as the young woman is caught between her studies and her illness.
Working herself into exhaustion, she is taken home by her new boyfriend (Nicholas Reinke) and, filled with religious dread, allows herself to be exorcised by a young priest (Jens Harzer).
The film eschews melodrama but its anger is palpable. If the Hollywood film suggested support for religious fundamentalism, its much superior equivalent has no truck with it.
This is one of several recent movies which prove German cinema has woken from a long sleep.
Requiem
Cert: 12A
