February 27, 2024
Re: Oscar Season, ANATOMY OF A FALL, and Marital Guilt; or, What Does 50 Cent Have to Do with Frater Taciturnus?
On January 23, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released its annual Oscar nominations. The winners will be revealed on live television on March 10, and I suspect that the show will draw a bigger audience than in recent years. After all, 2023 was the year of the so-called “Barbenheimer” phenomenon—a period of cinematic fanfare, planned and unplanned, that accompanied the simultaneous release of Greta Gerwig’s satirical comedy Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s epic biopic Oppenheimer. I saw both Barbie and Oppenheimer—alas, not as a double feature—and I liked them both. That each blockbuster garnered a “Best Picture” nomination was hardly surprising, though I do not consider Barbie Gerwig’s best movie to date (that would be 2017’s Lady Bird), nor do I lack reservations about the conclusion of Oppenheimer. Nevertheless, I suspect that the latter will rack up a fair share of Academy Awards, even if it faces stiff competition from other important 2023 releases, including Martin Scorsese’s acclaimed (if not flawless) crime drama Killers of the Flower Moon.
At any rate, and as is often the case, the recent Oscar nominations encouraged me to go back over the best movies of the previous year and to see what I missed. A handful of films immediately jumped out—American Fiction, The Zone of Interest, and Anatomy of a Fall (Anatomie d'une chute). So, on a rainy Saturday night, with 75% of my children at home, I gathered the family around to watch a movie. I picked Anatomie d'une chute because it has the “bones” of a courtroom drama—a reliable and accessible genre that my kids would likely tolerate. That the movie is largely (but not exclusively) in French was a potential roadblock. However, I reasoned that the exposure to a different language and culture was worth the risk. So everyone sat down with a beverage of their choosing—a double Islay single malt for me, please—and we started the movie.
For the first 45 minutes or so, Anatomie d’une chute proved gripping. Set in the French Alps, not far from the city of Grenoble, the movie begins with an intriguingly uncomfortable domestic spat. Two women are sitting in a charming mountain chalet, sharing a glass of wine. We quickly learn that the older of these two women is a well-known German writer named Sandra Voyter (Sandra Hüller, in an Oscar-nominated performance). The other is an admiring student, who has been asked to interview Sandra for an upcoming publication. One would assume that Sandra would largely guide their discussion, but there is a desperate intensity in her eyes—an implied sexual longing perhaps, but also something deeper. Sandra is lonely and unhappy, even as she is enjoying the fruits of literary success.
Then the music begins. We’re not sure where it’s coming from or why it’s playing, but it’s clearly an obstacle for the two characters on screen. They can hardly hear one another. Visibly annoyed, Sandra explains that the cause of the disruption is her husband Samuel, who is doing home renovations upstairs. In a normal situation, the offending party would simply be asked to turn down the music. But something else is going on, and Sandra knows it. Perhaps the clue lies in the song itself—a wordless, jazz-and-calypso-infused version of the song P.I.M.P. (2003) by the American rapper 50 Cent. The music, in and of itself, is cheerful and tropically enchanting:
Yet, the lyrics of 50 Cent’s track contain a dark underbelly. They are, indeed, written from the perspective of a “pimp”—a slang noun that can be traced back to the French adjective pimpant, which means “seductive” or “alluring in dress.” In the song P.I.M.P., the narrator claims that he has beguiled a woman in whom he has erotic interest: “She like my style, she like my smile, she like the way I talk,” he crows, “Girl, we could pop some Champagne and we could have a ball / We could toast to the good life, girl, we could have it all.” And yet, as the song’s title pithily reveals, the narrator’s romancing is nothing but a thin veneer for an underlying misogyny and misanthropy. He hates other people; he only cares about himself. As 50 Cent puts it, “I told you fools before, I stay with the tools / I keep a Benz, some rims, and some jewels / I holla at a ho 'til I got a bitch confused / She got on Payless, me I got on gator shoes.”
With such lyrics in mind—to be sure, these are some of 50 Cent’s more subdued lines—it seems clear that Samuel has chosen to blare “P.I.M.P.” for a particular reason. The song is both an accusation against Sandra and a warning to the student. Yes, Sandra is charismatic—she has “rizz,” as my kids say—but she is unrepentantly selfish and, for that reason, a threat to others. Sandra seems to feel the force of this nonverbal allegation. Simultaneously embarrassed and annoyed, she tells her interlocutor that they will have to reschedule for another time. The student leaves, and Sandra goes to her room to work with her headphones on—or so we’re later told. For, just hours later, Samuel’s body is discovered in the snow outside. He had fallen from the chalet’s attic window and hit his head on an adjacent shed, killing him almost instantly.
Thus the mystery at the heart of Anatomie d’une chute is revealed: did Samuel commit suicide, or was he murdered by his wife? In a different kind of movie, this “whodunit” would unfold in steps, with detectives, forensics experts, and lawyers slowly but surely solving the case. And, to be sure, there are procedural elements in Anatomie d’une chute, from the suave, if solicitous defense attorney Vincent Renzi (Swann Arlaud) to the relentless, tough-talking prosecutor played by Antoine Reinartz. Yet, as suspicion around Sandra grows and as her case goes to trial, the film shifts gears. It becomes less of a courtroom drama and more of a dissection or, better yet, an autopsy of a dead marriage.
This is where Anatomie d’une chute surprises the viewer. For the more we learn about Sandra and Samuel’s relationship, the more confused we become. In real life, autopsies are meant to determine the cause of a person’s death. Yet, regardless of its legal verdict, Anatomie d’une chute never retreats from a fundamental ambiguity. While it is possible that Sandra didn’t push Samuel from the chalet’s upper story, their marriage seemed to kill him all the same. The couple faced any number of problems. She is German; he was French. They attempted to bridge this cultural-linguistic gap by speaking English around the house, but this compromise only manifested their differences. There was a personal residuum, as it were, that could not be conveyed in their day-to-day interactions. They remained strangers even within their marriage. This sense of alienation carried into their vocational choices. At one point, both Sandra and Samuel harbored desires to write, but only Sandra was able to find success. Not only was she given more latitude to work on her craft, but she was more cutthroat in her approach. Indeed, Sandra readily admits that the basic idea behind one of her books was borrowed from Samuel, but, as she sees it, he proved incapable of converting it into an actual production. Whether or not Sandra thereby “betrayed” her husband or simply delivered where he failed remains an open question. Finally, there is the tragic case of their son Daniel, who has significant vision problems due to a childhood accident—one for which each parent blames the other.
As these problems mounted, Sandra and Samuel’s marriage began to degenerate. It wasn’t just that they had problems; it was that they couldn’t decide who was responsible for their problems. Anatomie d’une chute explores this issue in painstaking detail, so much so that the dramatic momentum of the film’s opening begins to wane. In one key flashback, we see an ordinary conversation explode into a violent rage. It’s not so much riveting as exasperating. Sandra and Samuel love one another, but the question of guilt—the muddle of deciding who is culpable for their marital woes—is ripping their relationship apart. Nor does Anatomie d’une chute resolve this ambiguity with a “tell-all” ending. The wounds are so deep that, as the film wraps up, we are denied the catharsis (κάθαρσις) that Aristotle famously identified with good tragedy. The viewer experiences “terror and pity,” but no cleansing.
For that reason, Anatomie d’une chute does not quite rise to the level of cinematic excellence. I cannot, for example, see it rivaling Oppenheimer or Killers of the Flower Moon for “Best Picture” honors. Still, one must give credit where credit is due. Anatomie d’une chute plumbs the abyssal measure of human relationships in a way that few films dare to do. Indeed, it almost seems to be making a philosophical point about human love—one that, in my opinion, recalls Søren Kierkegaard’s epistolary novella “‘Guilty?’/‘Not Guilty?’: A Story of Suffering: An Imaginary Psychological Construction by Frater Taciturnus” (“Skyldig?”—“Ikke-Skyldig?”: En Lidelseshistorie: Psychologisk Experiment af Frater Taciturnus).
Shrouded in layers of pseudonymity, and constituting the third major section of Stages on Life’s Way: Studies by Various Persons (Stadier på Livets Vej: Studier af Forskjellige, 1845), “‘Guilty?’/‘Not Guilty?’” was later described by Kierkegaard as a study of “a character in tension in the most extreme mortal danger of the spirit to the point of despair.” The story is so gloomy, Kierkegaard adds, that Frater Taciturnus, its “imaginary constructor” (Experimentator), must include himself in the telling, so as to protect the reader from falling into danger herself. After all, the antihero of “‘Guilty?’/‘Not Guilty?’” is a threatening figure, and “such people are usually not allowed to walk along without being accompanied by a pair of policemen—for the sake of public security.”
That this story comes from the pit of human experience is made clear in a brief preamble. Frater Taciturnus tells of a recent visit to Søborg Sø—a marshy lake in northern Zealand, which, incidentally, was drained for a canal system in the 1870s. According to Taciturnus, he accompanied an ecologist on “a flat-bottomed boat” tour of Søborg Sø. After poling through a cluster of reeds “as dense and thick as a forest,” the two men finally arrived at what appeared to be a “calm sea.” There they took in the surrounding landscape and, in the process, “uprooted marine plants” for study. Yet, in his efforts to help, Taciturnus made a surprising discovery of his own: he accidentally fished a watertight box out of the lake’s murky depths, and it contained, among other things, a “neatly handwritten manuscript on very fine letter paper.” It is this manuscript—in truth, a diary—that Taciturnus has published as “‘Guilty?’/‘Not Guilty?’.
As Taciturnus points out, the author of this work remains unknown and thus is referred to as “Quidam” or “someone.” Quidam’s diary is long and brutal reading, itself comprising over 200 pages in the standard English translation of Stages on Life’s Way. It starts on January 3rd and ends on July 7th, though Quidam does not identify the year, nor does he provide entries for every calendar day. The unfolding logbook is more impressionistic than systematic—a scattershot sequence of passages, typically labeled Morgen or Midnat, which explore Quidam’s mental state in the wake of a broken engagement. Alas, things are not looking good. Not only has Quidam fallen into a sulking depression—a passion for reflection that resembles “self-torment”—but the object of his worry is a failed relationship. “Why didn’t it work out?” “With whom does the fault lie?” Quidam seems to believe that, if he turns the matter over in his head enough, he will find a way to exonerate himself and, in turn, attain peace of mind. But this terminus ad quem is elusive. There is always another way to look at their estrangement. From this side, it appears that she is to blame; from that side, the culpability is apparently his. So Quidam presses on, growing more despondent in the process. The proverbial walls are closing in.
The oppressive weight of unrepentant reflection also marks the last third of Anatomie d’une chute. The more Sandra is forced to confront her marital infidelities, the more guilty she looks. Even her writing projects, the prosecution is happy to point out, evince a preoccupation with spousal conflict and violent ideation. Sandra responds that one cannot conflate thoughts with actions, but there is always the possibility that her literature betrays her intentions, the latter of which may have been actualized in a fit of semiconscious rage. Like Quidam, Sandra falls into despair. Moreover, as the legal verdict gets closer and closer, even her son Daniel begins to doubt her. She appears to be a loving wife and mother, but is she?
Without entirely giving away the film’s ending, I’ll simply say that Anatomie d’une chute refuses to “clear” Sandra of Samuel’s death. Legal decisions, it is suggested, are just one part of the story. In the end, whether or not one is “guilty” is something that can be known only in the recesses of one’s conscience. Perhaps that is why Anatomie d’une chute ends on a note of quiet ambiguity, with a downcast (or relieved?) Sandra comforted by the family dog Snoop.
According to Frater Taciturnus, Quidam’s diary leaves us with a similar feeling. No matter how much he tries to exonerate himself, Quidam “cannot find rest.” The facts of the case are simply too opaque for him to reach a determinate verdict. Quidam is neither “guilty” nor “not guilty.” He is both. So it is with Sandra as well.
It is precisely here, however, that Kierkegaard’s text breaks with Anatomie d’une chute. While the latter accepts, if not revels in, the equivocation and uncertainty of human life—the melancholic and, indeed, almost Sophoclean sense that we are bound to unknowable and ultimately tragic forces—Stages on Life’s Way points towards the only way out of this predicament. As Frater Taciturnus argues, Quidam is not the victim of a mysterious evil but of himself. His desire to be in the right has only secured unhappiness. For the more Quidam tortures himself with questions about moral culpability, the longer he defers the only peace and reconciliation found in this world—that which comes through God-relationship. But there is a catch. In a theme borrowed from Kierkegaard’s 1843 opus Either/Or: A Fragment of Life (Enten—Eller: Et Livs-Fragment), Taciturnus insists that, from the perspective of eternity, a human being can only ever be guilty in relation to God. Quidam’s passion, then, is fundamentally aesthetic. He draws a peculiar pleasure from remaining in despair. The vivifying clarity of confession and penance is suspended in favor of a self-centered clinging to misfortune and tragedy.
The implications of Taciturnus’ analysis in particular, and of Kierkegaard’s thinking in general, are manifold. “Is this not depressing?” one might ask. Moreover, does not Taciturnus suggest that God stands over against human beings—a sanctimonious judge who demands our humiliation? In subsequent works, however, Kierkegaard makes clear that he is addressing something far deeper than moralistic pieties. Religious guilt is not fundamentally about misbehavior—saying too many “bad words” or what have you—but about a qualitative existential cleft between our mundane lives and eternal ideals. Even at our best, we fall short, and this situation cannot be remedied. As finite beings, we are simply incapable of fully realizing infinite demands. Thus we can only establish a relationship with God on the basis of what we lack, on the basis of our shortcomings, which lie both in “what [we] have done and in what [we] have failed to do.” In this recognition, there is unfailing certainty and hence, as Kierkegaard elsewhere puts it, “purity of heart.” This is the essential step towards the psycho-spiritual “rest” that eludes Quidam and, indeed, Sandra.
After all, Anatomie d’une chute provides no such religious egress. It is doubt and despair all the way down, from the opening notes of “P.I.M.P.” to the hollowness of Sandra’s concluding gaze. And yet, as Kierkegaard would surely agree, therein lies the film’s import and value, provided that its worldview is not taken as the last word.
Really enjoyed the piece! - first, a commendation of bravery for sitting down the family to watch a film that's about analyzing family problems deeply - always seems like a kinda risky proposal somehow! - secondly, the exposition of Guilty/Not Guilty provides the more non-expert Kierkegaard reader like me with another brilliant side of Kierkegaard's insights into the profound inability to reflect oneself into resolution with oneself.
I appreciate the mention of "Purity of Heart" - one of the SK texts that's impacted me the most, and from reading your take on Guilty/Not Guilty made me think about how one can say quite simply that the effort of reflection to rationalize oneself becomes simply another form of double-mindedness, the further agitation of "qualitative existential cleft between our mundane lives and eternal ideals." Lastly - very Lenten piece! The preachers/liturgists out there appreciate can appreciate "what we have done and left undone" as a reference to confession.