“I played the part, I’m not that man,” says the late-70s-era Christopher Reeve, promoting his breakthrough role as a costumed comic-book superhero, years before the devastating horse-riding accident that would leave him paralysed and hooked to a ventilator. The actor’s biography is invariably framed as a tale of two halves. Triumph and disaster. The charmed and the cursed. But Ian Bonhote and Peter Ettedgui’s polished, respectful documentary – made with the support of Reeve’s surviving family – does well in linking both sides, painting the whole person and showing how his essential good character was revealed and sharpened by the crisis that befell him. On screen, the man play-acted the qualities of courage and resilience. Off it, he came to embody them too.

• In UK and Irish cinemas