Worth: $18.00
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Sandra Huller, Swann Arlaud, Milo Machado Graner, Samuel Theis, Antoine Reinartz
Intro:
… naturalistic, razor-sharp and believable to an almost uncanny degree.
On the surface, Anatomy of a Fall is predominantly a courtroom drama, but superficial is one thing it’s definitely not. Essentially, it’s a psychological drama, and a rather cerebral and sophisticated one.
The film looks great, set (initially) in the French Alps. Very early in the piece, Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theis) – a would-be author with writer’s block – is found dead in the snow outside his chalet, apparently having fallen from its attic. Was it an accident? Did he commit suicide? Or was he murdered by his wife, Sandra Voyter (Sandra Huller), herself a writer but a successful one? Their eleven-year-old son Daniel (Milo Machado Graner), though blind, may hold the key to the answer.
A year later, the trial is on and, though we do want to know what happened, what follows is more a dissection of a marriage and its disintegration than a whodunit. For a while, though well acted and well made, it plods a bit. As in so many really good movies, however, all the exposition is vindicated by the great dividends it reaps. The whole thing leaps to a terrific other level once we get to a flashback of the couple having an extremely intense argument. The performances in this scene are particularly brilliant.
The dialogue in Anatomy of a Fall – much of it ‘rapid-fire’ – is naturalistic, razor-sharp and believable to an almost uncanny degree. Huller (Toni Erdmann, upcoming Zone of Interest) is excellent at every turn, whether her character’s emotions are being barely contained or overtly expressed. But Graner is even better; it’s quite something to see such a young actor capable of suggesting inner depths and complexities. This is definitely a boy with a huge future.
Highly recommended.
