Vivid scene-setting and a pithy script show that the film's makers were on to something right from the start.

The script showed him as a vulnerable, troubled and flawed character.

The small script shows the writer can shut out distractions and focus on goals.

It adds to an acerbic script that shows its characters caught uncomfortably between youth and imagined decrepitude.

The same ritual — denunciation in the state press, expulsion from the party, a scripted show trial and a long sentence — has repeated itself to consume bureaucrats, generals and business people.