Bhutto

Rather than treat its subject as the sort of martyr to democracy that makes good copy in the West, Bhutto digs deeper.

Boasting a rock-solid academic architecture, Bhutto is a film bursting at the seams with gravitas.

People called the Bhuttos "The Kennedys of Pakistan" and, in a parallel with our losses, the Pakistanis suffered the untimely deaths of Benazir, her father, and her two brothers.

Contextualizing the prime minister's rise to power within a larger portrait of a nation under constant internal and external siege, Bhutto conveys a forceful sense of tectonic social and geopolitical shifts, as well as the courageous, heartbreaking personal sacrifices its subject made in service to both her homeland and ideals.

Bhutto is smart and thorough on the inflamed history of Pakistan. But as a portrait of the first woman elected head of state in an Islamic nation, it comes closer to hero-worship than to considered biography.

Part biography, part idol worship, Bhutto is a bullet train through South Asia, chronicling its subject's 54 years, a period of unrest in her nation and family.

The Bhutto family is often referred to as the "Pakistani Kennedys." After seeing this film, that designation doesn't sound so glib anymore.