Documentary on how composer Dmitri Shostakovich used his Fourth to Ninth Symphony as a silent protest against the crimes of Stalin.

A young woman, married to a wealthy man, but miserably lonely; trapped within a world ruled with an iron fist. Katerina is driven by a lust for life and for love. Her husband, though, is impotent; her father-in-law a tyrant. No wonder, then, that she longs to free herself from this yoke. When Sergei starts work on the family estate, she sees in him a chance for salvation. However, their subsequent affair marks the beginning of a descent into crime.

Banned by Soviet authorities when it was first completed, this requiem for Russian composer and pianist Dmitri Shostakovich pays homage to the remarkable works and difficult path of the influential artist. Through personal documents, performances and archival footage, this emotional study charts Shostakovich's turbulent life, from his early success to his disgrace under Stalin and his eventual embrace as one of his country's most gifted talents.

Katerina murders her husband and her father-in-law. She and her new beau are both sent to Siberia, where the lover almost immediately takes up with a younger woman.

Experimental filmmaker Rubén Gámez explores the iconography of the maguey plant in Mexican cinematic history.