Ask Dr Ruth

"At 90, I'm still talking about sex from morning till night," says Dr Ruth Westheimer, who sparked a one-woman revolution in how sex was discussed in the 1980s. Director Ryan White's documentary about the life of the German-accented American sex expert captures the upbeat energy of a cheerful nonagenarian whose sunny personality belies a tragic past. The young Karola Ruth Siegel escaped the fate of her parents in the Holocaust by being sent to Switzerland, and from there moved to British-occupied Palestine, where she trained to be a sniper and was almost crippled in a shell blast. Her quest for education brought her to America where she gained her doctorate. But it was when a radio station needed someone who could talk about sex for a 15-minute midnight call-in show that Dr Ruth became an instant celebrity. Discussing the practice and politics of sex in a non-shaming, sane and fact-based way engaged a huge swathe of the population. The film tracks her decades of media exposure, impressing in its portrayal of an unstoppable personality who takes a genuine interest in making people happier. White focuses on Westheimer as a person, showing her as a ray of light that broke through the darkest of clouds.