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The compelling courtroom drama is reviewed by David Langwallner
Anatomy of a Fall traces the criminal justice procedure (admittedly in France) from beginning to end. Many elements are inquisitorial, including a far-too-close association between the prosecutor and bench, but there is also a jury so it translates well to an English audience.
Directed by Justine Triet, who co-wrote the screenplay with Arthur Harai, the film was heavily Oscar nominated and collected Best Original Screenplay, as well as The Palme D’Or 2023 among many other accolades.
The story concerns a successful novelist, Sandra Voyter (Sandra Huller) of Germanic origin who is married to a French teacher/aspiring writer Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theiss). They live in a glorious Swiss-type chateau in Grenoble where they speak English to communicate – which I suppose could be a metaphor for misunderstanding.
The film begins in the prelude to Maleski’s death. Voyter is portrayed warts and all, describing the chateau (unfairly, in my view) as a ‘shithole’ and she is shown in an intimate and flirtatious conversation with a visiting journalist just before her husband’s death. The mystery is whether this was an accidental fall from the top-storey window, a push or suicide.
The accused, Voyter, who also has many good traits, is not sanctified. Nor is the victim – a fine teacher now failed writer, taking perhaps too many anti-depressants. A central theme is whether his professional failure was a contributory factor. This is noticeably highlighted in an audio recording he made the day before when Voyter is quite waspish about his self-pity. In a crucial motif, though, she plagiarises some of his unpublished work.
In an overly cynical response, her defence lawyer Vincent (Swann Arlaud) tells Voyter that a trial is not about truth as she protests her innocence. Well, my response is it ought to be or at least an attempt to reach that elusive point. At times he is masterful and diligent in his analysis of the case, and points out the importance of ‘sway’– how one salient fact or another may tilt the balance. This is something of which all lawyers are acutely conscious, and indeed, wary.
The Prosecutor (Antoine Reinartz) is overly demonised and looks, perhaps deliberately, like a skinhead which invokes the sense of a ‘boot boy’ with brains. Certainly, he is most leading and suggestive to the child in a way which would not be sanctioned in an English court and more than dismissive of Voyter’s evidence, as well as interventionist, hectoring and bullying at times.
The film appeals on many levels to the legal mindset – from how we interpret plagiarism to how we interpret memories. Indeed, the verdict is secured by the evidence of their son Daniel (Milo Machado-Graner) who at the last minute is recalled and interprets an incident and the subsequent conversation with his father as a metaphor. It did occur to me how often witnesses after a lapse of time attribute more significance than they should to an item of evidence barely seen or barely heard.
Other interpretations? Is the husband’s recording of arguments, including where there has been harm inflicted on her, an example of coercive behaviour? How convincing is expert evidence? The film seems to suggest that it was impossible a fall caused his death but often there is a spectrum of doubt. Many experts I have cross-examined are aware of cognitive bias and allow for doubt.
Can the sound of music blot out a fall? And how loud must it be to do so? Public Enemy in the film are supposed to very loud but instrumental Public Enemy less so. The court looked out of their comfort zone here, reminding me of the US Supreme Court copyright case Campbell v Acuff Rose Music, Inc., 510 US 569 (1994) where the judges grappled with whether a parody rap sexualised version of ‘Pretty Woman’ by Roy Orbison was copyright protected.
The film also makes the fundamental point that much of our lives consists of stories and both the prosecutor and defence counsel provide alternative narratives. In an entirely different context and in my view the best film ever made about eyewitness identification is Kurasawa’s Rashomon (1950) which gives a better insight than reading the judgment in R v Turnbull [1977] QB 224. Though interpretation is part of the trial process it must be treated with scepticism. Not once but several times in the fictionalised case does the judge admonish the prosecutor to stick to the evidence and the truth.
We are left with doubt as the film ends. Most of us in the profession have reflected when someone has been acquitted whether they were guilty or not but equally in, its anatomy of the trial process from beginning to end, all of us should be conscious of how many people falsely accused must face us.
David Langwallner is a graduate of the Harvard Law School and the London School of Economics. He is a barrister at 1MCB and was 2015 Irish Lawyer of the Year for his work as director of the Irish Innocence Project.
Anatomy of a Fall traces the criminal justice procedure (admittedly in France) from beginning to end. Many elements are inquisitorial, including a far-too-close association between the prosecutor and bench, but there is also a jury so it translates well to an English audience.
Directed by Justine Triet, who co-wrote the screenplay with Arthur Harai, the film was heavily Oscar nominated and collected Best Original Screenplay, as well as The Palme D’Or 2023 among many other accolades.
The story concerns a successful novelist, Sandra Voyter (Sandra Huller) of Germanic origin who is married to a French teacher/aspiring writer Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theiss). They live in a glorious Swiss-type chateau in Grenoble where they speak English to communicate – which I suppose could be a metaphor for misunderstanding.
The film begins in the prelude to Maleski’s death. Voyter is portrayed warts and all, describing the chateau (unfairly, in my view) as a ‘shithole’ and she is shown in an intimate and flirtatious conversation with a visiting journalist just before her husband’s death. The mystery is whether this was an accidental fall from the top-storey window, a push or suicide.
The accused, Voyter, who also has many good traits, is not sanctified. Nor is the victim – a fine teacher now failed writer, taking perhaps too many anti-depressants. A central theme is whether his professional failure was a contributory factor. This is noticeably highlighted in an audio recording he made the day before when Voyter is quite waspish about his self-pity. In a crucial motif, though, she plagiarises some of his unpublished work.
In an overly cynical response, her defence lawyer Vincent (Swann Arlaud) tells Voyter that a trial is not about truth as she protests her innocence. Well, my response is it ought to be or at least an attempt to reach that elusive point. At times he is masterful and diligent in his analysis of the case, and points out the importance of ‘sway’– how one salient fact or another may tilt the balance. This is something of which all lawyers are acutely conscious, and indeed, wary.
The Prosecutor (Antoine Reinartz) is overly demonised and looks, perhaps deliberately, like a skinhead which invokes the sense of a ‘boot boy’ with brains. Certainly, he is most leading and suggestive to the child in a way which would not be sanctioned in an English court and more than dismissive of Voyter’s evidence, as well as interventionist, hectoring and bullying at times.
The film appeals on many levels to the legal mindset – from how we interpret plagiarism to how we interpret memories. Indeed, the verdict is secured by the evidence of their son Daniel (Milo Machado-Graner) who at the last minute is recalled and interprets an incident and the subsequent conversation with his father as a metaphor. It did occur to me how often witnesses after a lapse of time attribute more significance than they should to an item of evidence barely seen or barely heard.
Other interpretations? Is the husband’s recording of arguments, including where there has been harm inflicted on her, an example of coercive behaviour? How convincing is expert evidence? The film seems to suggest that it was impossible a fall caused his death but often there is a spectrum of doubt. Many experts I have cross-examined are aware of cognitive bias and allow for doubt.
Can the sound of music blot out a fall? And how loud must it be to do so? Public Enemy in the film are supposed to very loud but instrumental Public Enemy less so. The court looked out of their comfort zone here, reminding me of the US Supreme Court copyright case Campbell v Acuff Rose Music, Inc., 510 US 569 (1994) where the judges grappled with whether a parody rap sexualised version of ‘Pretty Woman’ by Roy Orbison was copyright protected.
The film also makes the fundamental point that much of our lives consists of stories and both the prosecutor and defence counsel provide alternative narratives. In an entirely different context and in my view the best film ever made about eyewitness identification is Kurasawa’s Rashomon (1950) which gives a better insight than reading the judgment in R v Turnbull [1977] QB 224. Though interpretation is part of the trial process it must be treated with scepticism. Not once but several times in the fictionalised case does the judge admonish the prosecutor to stick to the evidence and the truth.
We are left with doubt as the film ends. Most of us in the profession have reflected when someone has been acquitted whether they were guilty or not but equally in, its anatomy of the trial process from beginning to end, all of us should be conscious of how many people falsely accused must face us.
The compelling courtroom drama is reviewed by David Langwallner
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