The Painful "Anatomy of a Fall"

A writer named Sandra Voyter (Sandra Hüller) is suspected of murdering her husband, Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theis), after he's found dead from a fall from the top floor of their house.  The body was discovered by their young blind son Daniel (Milo Machado-Graner), who becomes a key witness in his mother's trial.  But as more and more comes out about Sandra and Samuel's rocky relationship, Daniel doesn't know what version of the truth to believe.

"Anatomy of a Fall" has a distinctly multicultural nature.  Sandra is a German woman who has married a French man and lives in France.  She's more comfortable speaking English than French, so the dialogue in the film is fairly evenly split between the two languages.  However, Sandra frequently seems to have trouble communicating.  She lies to the investigators about certain details around the death, struggles to explain why her marriage was so contentious, and her behavior is often puzzling.  Her attorney Renzi (Swann Arlaud) is as puzzled by her as everyone else.  Does her evasiveness and coldness indicate that she doesn't care about her husband or does this point to something else? Is she less demonstrative because she's German?  Is she less trustworthy because she's a writer?

It's been a long time since I've watched any kind of courtroom drama where I wasn't sure how the ending would turn out.  I could tell that the aggressive questioning of the zealous prosecutor (Antoine Reinartz) was probably supposed to make me feel more sympathetic to Sandra, but I wasn't sure if that was also a misdirection.  Sandra is a successful novelist and often seems to be constructing a convenient narrative to absolve herself of any guilt.  Because Samuel is dead, we only have her side of the story for most of the movie, but there are so many little details that point to very troubling behavior on her part.  The film purposefully allows the audience to mentally construct their own version of Samuel by keeping him offscreen for most of the film, and then challenges all your assumptions in the film's most devastating scene.

Sandra Hüller's performance is the key to why the film works as well as it does.  From the opening where she avoids personal questions during an interview, to the intense courtroom scenes where you can't tell how much of her testimony is true - and if it's true whether it might be colored by her own biases, everything she does seems to raise doubt and suspicions.  I felt myself on guard every time she was onscreen, trying to figure out how and why she was lying, even though I was also sympathetic to her situation the whole way through.  It's a relief when she finally has a recognizably genuine emotional reaction late in the film.

I've seen several films like this, usually darker thrillers that end with an unsettling moral ambiguity.  I like the way that writer/director Justine Triet goes in a different direction.  She never reveals what actually caused Samuel's death, but in the face of there being no clear answer, a choice still has to be made, and Triet ensures that the right person makes it.  While there are lingering questions that I'm sure viewers will have fun debating, "Anatomy of a Fall" makes its case that this is ultimately pointless to the parties who have been the most hurt by Samuel's death.  We don't get the truth, but we do get an emotional and thematic resolution.  

At two and a half hours, "Anatomy of a Fall" is a lengthy, but absorbing watch.  Like most courtroom dramas, the proceedings are accelerated and somewhat sensationalized, but the central characters and relationships feel genuine in their unknowability.  The chilly winter visuals emphasize the characters' psychological isolation, but never feel oppressive.  There's a wonderful matter-of-factness to the film's tone, especially the procedural aspects of the investigation and trial preparation, that keep it very immediate and accessible.  

And despite all the language switches, the unfamiliar French legal and police procedures, and Sandra's inscrutability, I had no trouble following what the film was doing.  And now I have a lot of Justine Triet films I need to go catch up on.

---