I, Olga Hepnarova

This Czech film tells the true story of Olga Hepnarová, who in 1973 drove a truck into a crowd at a Prague tram stop, killing eight people. Before the attack, she had mailed a letter explaining her act to two newspapers, but postal delays meant it arrived two days after the killings. Her insanity defense was rejected at trial, and she was sentenced to death, hanged at Pankrác Prison on March 12, 1975, at age twenty three, the last woman ever executed in Czechoslovakia. Directors Tomáš Weinreb and Petr Kazda shot the film in black and white, largely in static shots and without a musical score, a deliberate formal choice meant to convey Olga's alienation. Polish actress Michalina Olszańska, who plays Hepnarová, won Best Actress at the Czech Lion Awards after the film opened the Panorama section at the 2016 Berlin Film Festival. Variety called it "a case study of extreme trauma yielded by adolescent bullying and parental neglect," noting that it avoids sensationalism throughout. Who it's for: Followers of Central European drama that treats a real crime with formal distance rather than sensationalism. Who it's not for: Not for viewers seeking emotional identification or a brisk pace, since the film's deliberate coldness and slow rhythm can be a hard sit.