The first film flashed through my mind while watching Anatomy of a Fall is Saint-Omer. Another courtroom drama arrests our brains. So, in the script written by Director Justine Triet and her husband, Arthur Harari, lies the truth about crawling marriages. It’s a trap you are in and you also know, the tunnel is too long to find the light. That dark journey is an everyday reality. Now, their kid Daniel (a brilliant Milo Machado Graner) goes out for a walk with his doggy when his parents start a hard talk. That’s his self-mechanism to be impartial.
Sandra (Sasndra Hüller) and Samuel (Samuel Theis) are such a couple who don’t even remember what united them. It’s not the love of language, countries, or even literature as one is a successful author and the other is an aspiring writer. The recorded fight produced at the court after Samuel’s death falling from the attic window dissects themselves and a rotting marriage. I see conditioned gender roles in it. I see an unsuccessful author’s low self-esteem in it. I see the prime skill of an intelligent lady to delve deeper into real problems. When Samuel finds things imposing, Sandra defines them as a middle ground for fluid life. This is very much relatable even to me as in how you aspire to be an intellectual couple before marriage and where you end up after some years in marriage. Who broke the promises, who failed to address the realities of finance, equal gender roles in child care and household, and most importantly who got hurt more? Such a thought-provoking scene was that! Fiercely penned to put both in a blind spot. I think as a creative film couple, some aspects of it may be owing to Triet’s personal life. Interestingly, Sandra, a practical writer pulls off her themes from Samuel’s threads, who stumbles at expanding them into words.
Sandra Hüller’s excellent characterization of Sandra tightly holds Anatomy of a Fall. There are compelling arguments by the prosecution lawyer (Antoine Reinartz) aided by an intricate script. It’s a beautifully trapped end leaves the audience frozen just like Samuel’s dead body in the snow.