Anatomy of a Fall

The winner of this year’s Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, Justine Triet’s drama is a riveting procedural and a delicate inquiry into the impossibility of an ultimate truth in human relationships. When the husband of famous novelist Sandra Voyter (played by Toni Erdmann’s Sandra Hüller) is found dead on the ground outside their chalet in the French Alps, authorities suspect that she might have been responsible, as the impact and position of his body suggest a push rather than a fall. This leads to a murder trial that puts every aspect of their marriage under impossible scrutiny, and whose outcome might hinge on the perspective of their vision-impaired 11-year-old son. Triet’s fiercely intelligent, emotionally devastating film dissects the ways we create subjective narratives for ourselves and others and questions the insufficiency of language to describe the essential mysteries each of us possesses. At its core is the brilliant Hüller, whose Sandra is articulate, open, and utterly inscrutable. A NEON release.

Film at Lincoln Center’s programming is generously supported by Tara Kelleher and Roy Zuckerberg.

Recommended Film Comment reading:

• Cannes 2023 Dispatch: Anatomy of a Fall 
• Interview: Justine Triet on Age of Panic (2014)
• Saturday Fiction and Sibyl

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