Anatomy of a Fall — a Marriage Under Oath
A woman, her blind son, their chalet in the French Alps. A husband is found dead at the foot of the house. The forensic evidence is inconclusive. She is charged. The trial begins. Justine Triet, already a Cannes veteran from Sibyl and In Bed with Victoria, won the Palme d'Or in 2023 for Anatomy of a Fall, a film that is ostensibly a courtroom procedural but is secretly a two-and-a-half-hour autopsy of a marriage.
What happened to Samuel is the question the film asks. Who were Samuel and Sandra to each other is the question it is actually investigating.
Sandra Huller
Sandra Huller, already the best German actress of her generation, plays Sandra Voyter as a bilingual novelist whose most useful language in the courtroom is irritation. She does not play Sandra as a victim. She does not play her as a cold killer. She plays her as a woman who is tired of having to explain herself to people who already decided she did it. It is a performance of extraordinary, unflashy intelligence. If Anora had not arrived, it would be my pick for the year.
The Dog
Snoop — the Border Collie who plays the family dog, Messi — won the Palm Dog at Cannes for a reason. The film contains one scene of astonishing animal performance that I will not spoil but which you will know when you see it. Messi, not the ballistics expert, is the most reliable witness the film gives us.
Subtitle Fatigue Is Not A Real Thing
Some friends have told me they "don't do" subtitled films. Anatomy of a Fall is two hours and thirty-two minutes of primarily French-language courtroom drama with secondary English and occasional German. Watch it anyway. The performances cross any language barrier. The structure — each courtroom day cuts to a different witness, each with a different theory of what kind of marriage the Voyters had — is as absorbing as any detective show. The ending is one of the most debated ambiguous endings in recent cinema, and I am on the side that believes Triet knows exactly what she's doing.
Currently playing at TIFF Bell Lightbox, Imagine Carlton, Cineplex Yonge-Dundas and Revue in Toronto. Find a showing.