Phoenix

Postwar Germany is the setting for a tale of denial and betrayal in this melancholy Holocaust drama originally filmed in 1965 as Return from the Ashes with Maximilian Schell and Ingrid Thulin. At the centre of director Christian Petzold's adaptation isNelly (Nina Hoss), a concentration camp survivor who returns to Berlin after having facial reconstruction surgery. Looking slightly different, she decides to track down her husband, Johnny (Ronald Zehrfeld), even though evidence suggests he may have given her up to the Nazis. When they come face to face, however, Johnny fails to recognise her, believing that she is a woman who just happens to look similar to his late wife. With Nelly playing along, he persuades her to pose as his dead spouse - in other words, to portray herself - so they can gain access to a large family inheritance. All of this plays out in a way that is restrained and understated to a fault, but Hoss is quietly devastating and there are one or two affecting moments.