Continuing my countdown of last year’s best films…

Best Films of 2023
#5. Anatomy of a Fall

Writer/director Justine Triet’s legal drama is the only movie on this list I’ve seen just once. It’s quite possible a second viewing will move it even higher.

This is a gripping courtroom thriller in which the guilt or innocence of the lead character is entirely beside the point. Did Sandra Huller’s Sandra, a successful novelist, push her husband off of their second floor balcony, or did he jump? Or was his falling death simply an accident?

Lawyers on both sides spend much of the runtime trying to make an argument one way or the other, but Triet is more interested in dissecting the dissection itself.

How would any marriage come across to impartial observers, stripped down to a recounting of its worst moments? When does the jealousy, regret, and resentment present in a complicated relationship add up to a motive for murder? When a married person dies, is it any wonder the spouse is usually the prime suspect?

Triet (who co-wrote the movie with her partner, Arthur Harari) explores these questions by focusing almost entirely on Sandra as she deals with her lawyer, her son, and the batshit crazy French legal system. Huller is a revelation, bringing a fierce intelligence and pride to her character, never asking for sympathy but somehow earning it anyway.

The perfect supporting cast includes Swann Arlaud as Sandra’s lawyer, Antoine Reinartz as the prosecutor, Jehnny Beth as a court-appointed caretaker, and Samuel Theis — in a brief but crucial role — as the late husband.

They say to never work with children or animals, but Triet got lucky on both counts, casting the wonderful Milo Machado-Graner as the couple’s visually-impaired son, and a Border Collie named Messi as Snoop, in what has to be the best performance ever given by a dog.

Triet’s direction ratchets up the tension by playing with point of view in ways both clever and maddening. We never see what actually happened at the moment of the death, even as flashbacks swirl around the incident from multiple perspectives. In the film’s most celebrated scene, we see an extended fight between the couple — recorded by the husband — but cut back to the courtroom just as the altercation turns physical.

In the American remake of this film that I hope never gets made, the ending would likely include some twisty stinger, a shocking reveal that recontextualizes everything and ties the movie up with a bow.

The ending we get is ambiguous — not to tantalize, but because this movie isn’t a mystery to solve. There are no answers, only the questions that pile up around us every day.