Joe Berlinger

A former Olympic champion wants to compete in the Berlin Marathon one last time. Paul Averhoff was once a great marathon runner, a legend, gold medal winner in Sydney 1958. In his day. Now, at well over 70, after repeated falls of his wife Margot, he is moving out of his familiar home after many happy years - also because daughter Birgit cannot take care of herself; she jets around the world as a flight attendant and is rarely available. In the old people's home, where Paul suddenly has to choose between a singing group and a handicraft lesson, the crucial question arises: That should have been it? Not with Paul. In order not to fall into a deep depression, he puts on his old racing shoes and begins to run in the home park. Day after day. Round by round. At first slow and pathetic, but then faster and faster. His roommates think he is crazy, especially since he claims to train for the Berlin Marathon and wants to win it too. When Margot lets himself be persuaded to train him as before with a strict hand, and Paul wins a race against the young nurse Tobias, the reluctance of the residents turns into enthusiasm. The "cloudy cups" become lively again, they remember their hero from days gone by, celebrate with him and cheer him on. And processes get mixed up in the old people's home. But then Margot dies, whereupon Paul falls into deep mourning. Can he still keep the promise his wife wrested from him shortly before her death? That he will finish his race even without her, keep running, unstoppable, out of sad thoughts, towards the marathon. For himself, but also for all those to whom he would like to prove it - his daughter Birgit, his roommates, an entire city.

The case of the West Memphis Three, its questionable circumstances and the parties involved are followed up years later. In 1994, three nonconformist boys in West Memphis, Arkansas were convicted for a horrific triple child murder. However, the original film shows how questionable evidence and a prejudiced community instead led to an apparent miscarriage of justice. The producers return to West Memphis to meet the Three again and the grassroots movement that has arisen to exonerate the Three. However, the father of one of the victims, John Mark Byers, is profiled as well as he belligerently asserts the three's guilt even as new evidence and his own criminal record draws suspicion on himself. —Kenneth Chisholm (kchishol@rogers.com)

A horrific triple child murder leads to an indictment and trial of three nonconformist boys based on questionable evidence. Berlinger and Sinofsky's documentary of a gruesome triple murder in West Memphis, Arkansas and the subsequent trials of three suspects, takes a hard look at both the occult and the American justice system in 'small-town' America. Three teenagers are accused of this horrific crime of killing three children, supposedly as a result of involvement in Satanism. As in their previous documentary, things turn out to be more complex than initial appearances and this film presents the real-life courtroom drama to the viewer, as it unfolds. —Tad Dibbern <DIBBERN_D@a1.mscf.upenn.edu>