Evaluating Awards Contenders: 'Anatomy of a Fall' and 'The Holdovers'
#247: "Anatomy of a Fall," "The Holdovers," "The Big Lebowski," "Fracture"
Edition 247:
Hey movie lovers!
As always, you can find a podcast version of this newsletter on Apple or Spotify. Thank you so much for listening and spreading the word!
This week: An award-winning French courtroom drama that may be a tough sell, and a 1970s nostalgia play that’s easy on the eyes (and heart). I’ll tell you about the podcast I guested on this week, and give yet another plug for the best airline movie selections. In this week’s “Trailer Watch,” Tiny Fey is bringing yet another version of her hit high school drama to market — enough already.
Anatomy of a Fall
Courtroom dramas are a staple in the movie landscape, mostly because of the juicy parts they offer actors to stand and deliver a heroic monologue. It’s an arena for good triumphing over evil. Think of Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird. A justice warrior!
What you almost never see is a court case where you don’t know what’s right and wrong, or which side should win or lose. Those are the stakes of Anatomy of a Fall, a movie set in the French Alps about the murder trial of a woman whose husband fell from the third floor of their cabin.
Did she do it? At no point does the movie tip its hand one way or another, and in fact it does an impressive job of presenting a compelling case for each outcome. Neon, the distributor, launched a whole promo website asking viewers to vote one way or another after watching the movie. It’s a pretty even split.
Now, that ambiguity might make some viewers mad. It’s a very European film sensibility, to live in that messy gray space and feel no need to resolve itself. Of course, it isn’t really about the facts of the case so much as exploring the relationship dynamics between man and wife, and parents and son, revealed in subjective slivers throughout the trial.
It’s a very good movie, though I realize right away that a 2hr30min arthouse flick in French is already too much to ask, so I will keep this week’s write-up brief. Most of you won’t watch this movie, and that’s fine, but it serves an important purpose in the annual movie calendar. Every year consensus rallies around on prestige-y foreign film and holds it up as capital “A” Art. After winning the Palme d’Or (the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival) and being received well by critics, this one is in the driver’s seat.
It’s not hard to see why. Anyone who opens themselves up to the experience will have a deep window into the complexities of modern marriage and parenting, plus its relationship with professional ambition. Our protagonist, an intellectual and author, thinks through stressors both common and extraordinary with a remarkable level of insight, and yet leaves open the possibility that she’s an entirely unreliable narrator.
Much of the second half of the movie takes place inside the courtroom, which is actually quite entertaining because of how different the French legal system is from our own. Thanks to other courtroom movies, most people have a very good sense of the procedures of a trial. Witnesses, questioning, cross examination, objections, hard evidence, jury of peers. French court is nothing like that. It’s more like a free form debate in which each side is trying to make the most convincing argument possible, whether it uses evidence or just speculation.
It’s a really juicy movie to chew on, and leaves you with a lot to talk about afterwards. In the interest of no spoilers, I’ll leave that for you to discover. As the award shows come up and you hear this name, maybe consider stretching yourself and checking it out.
Something New
The Holdovers (Theaters): Walking out of the theater after this movie, a father said to his son, “that movie reminded me of my father.” That, in essence, captures the entire appeal of this pure 1970s nostalgia play about a crabby professor at an elite boarding school (Paul Giamatti) who gets asked to watch over the kids who have nowhere to go over the Christmas holidays.
It’s funny, or at least the gray-haired people sitting to my left and right thought so (and in front of me too), mostly mining material from the “kids these days” observations about how older generations had to work twice as hard for half as much. Giamatti’s curmudgeon bonds with a young student, and each of them realizes the other is much more complex than they seem on the surface, and they can learn a lot from each other. Think Good Will Hunting, but in soft focus.
The stakes are incredibly low here, and the drama is softer than the comedy. But the movie succeeds as a warm hug, and I’m not entirely surprised to hear it being floated out there for awards considering the persistently white and old demographic of the Academy voting body. It’s a movie that is easily enjoyed. I recommend it, but I do so with the least amount of urgency. If you want to see it, you’ll get to it eventually.
Something Old
The Big Lebowski (1998, Netflix): While I was in New York I guested on the “Hank’s Infinite Playlist” podcast to talk about one of my favorite movies of all time, the cult classic stoner comedy starring Jeff Bridges as “The Dude.” Neither of the hosts had ever seen it, a crime. It’s a movie that needs no introduction or recommendation from me here, but is always primed for a rewatch.
Check out the movie then listen to me talk about it HERE.
Something to Stream
Fracture (United Airlines): Quick reminder: United’s movie selection is better than any streaming service on the planet. For free! I’m a big enough nerd that this has literally started altering my travel patterns, and since I know we’re entering that time of year where a lot of people travel, I thought I’d mention this under-the-radar selection in its library (for everyone else not flying, this movie is so worth the $3 VOD rental, I promise).
A super young Ryan Gosling stars in this 2007 legal thriller as an assistant district attorney who takes on an open-and-shut murder case against a man (Anthony Hopkins) who shoots his wife and confesses to the crime. Hopkins is turned up to 11 in a Hannibal Lector-esque role as a brilliant psychopath, and Gosling is awesome at dancing that line between charming hotshot and cocky jerk. Each scene between them is electric, as is Gosling’s dynamic with love interest Rosamund Pike, and the story itself is tightly wound with lots of twists and reversals. It’s one of my favorite courtroom movies I’ve ever seen.
Trailer Watch: Mean Girls
What started as a hot take I whispered silently to myself is increasingly becoming an opinion I don’t mind shouting from the (digital) rooftops. I sort of think Tina Fey might be one of those creators that had one great idea and is determined to milk it for all it’s worth. She wrote 2004’s Mean Girls, a phenomenon to that and every subsequent generation of young girls. Can’t knock that, it’s a huge accomplishment. But a sequel in 2011, then a Broadway adaptation in 2019, and now adapting the Broadway musical back into a reboot movie? It’s a bit much. Plus, I’m a little concerned that this entire trailer doesn’t include a single hint that this movie is a musical. Not a great sign. Counterpoint: Renee Rapp is playin Regina George (as she did on Broadway). I’ve been loving her debut album as a nascent pop star, and can’t wait to see what she can do here.