C&C 21: At the Movies and At the Movies
In which I link two films that have no business being linked, plus Siskel & Ebert
Anatomy of a Fall, which won the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, is being marketed as a mystery; the URL for the movie’s website is didshedoit.com. It’s understandable given the plot. Novelist Sandra Voyter finds herself on trial for murder after her husband dies under shadowy circumstances at their chalet in the French Alps. (Two of the best films I’ve seen in 2023, this one and The Night of the 12th, are open-ended crime dramas set in Grenoble.)
But the movie is about something thornier than a simple yes-or-no question. Its true subject is mystery itself, how we navigate life through a keyhole. The dense script by director Justine Triet and her partner Arthur Harari illuminates the theme in myriad ways. It switches between languages including English, with Voyter, fluent in all of them, choosing her tongue based on which best expresses her thoughts even as each shift shuts others out of the conversation. She protests having her marriage—and specifically an argument her husband recorded without her knowledge—interpreted by strangers when they’re only afforded glimpses of the relationship’s totality. It’s an odd complaint given that she writes autofiction, mining her own life for novels that present her side of events. Her son, visually impaired as a result of an accident for which his late father blamed himself, lives in a world defined primarily by what little he can see and his adolescent interpretations of his parents’ squabbling. The courtroom setting amplifies the subtext. Dueling expert witnesses sound equally credible as they demolish each other’s testimony, facts are exposed as suppositions, and memory becomes suspect.
It’s fascinating to watch a courtroom thriller that doesn’t play by American rules. The proceedings are more freewheeling, and in a way make more sense. Sandra Hüller, whose performance in Toni Erdmann (2016) I’ve thought of many times since seeing that movie, is again a powerhouse. Alexandra Schwartz, interviewing Triet for the New Yorker (there are mild spoilers in the piece), commented on how striking it was “that the woman in the couple would not try to accommodate the feelings of the man.” It makes for a compelling contrast with Fair Play, in which the woman in the couple desperately tries to accommodate the feelings of the man—who is keeping his real emotions hidden.
One day later, I caught up with a movie that, superficially, is worlds away from the chilly precision of Anatomy of a Fall. In the rambunctious R-rated comedy No Hard Feelings (2023), 32-year-old Maddie Barker (Jennifer Lawrence) is so desperate to replace her car that she agrees to a dubious deal proposed by two helicopter parents (Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti): “date” their bookish son (Andrew Barth Feldman) in the hope of loosening him up before he heads off to the Ivy League. As you’d expect with that premise, there’s raunchy material to spare, but it’s in service of a sweet story in a smartly structured screenplay by director Gene Stupnitsky and John Phillips. Lawrence gives a fully committed performance; during the wild scene when Maddie confronts some stoned teenagers on a beach, I had to remind myself that Lawrence is an Academy Award winner.
I linked these movies in my head, and not because I saw them in proximity. They’re both about women put in untenable positions by personal finances. Maddie is a townie in Montauk, Long Island, a playground for the rich. She hustles as a bartender and Uber driver so she can hang on to the house she inherited from her mother; losing her car means literally losing her place in the world. Sandra Voyter is sufficiently well-known as a writer that, as Anatomy of a Fall begins, she’s being interviewed, and her trial becomes talk-show fodder. But because of her son’s medical expenses, she’s forced to do translation work to cover the bills, and her husband is converting their home into a bed-and-breakfast. Money is never discussed enough, and here it fuels a (literal) balls-out comedy and an existential drama.
What I’m Reading
Putting movies in conversation with each other is a trick I learned from Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert. I cannot overstate how influential their shows were on me growing up. Watching them weigh in on documentaries, foreign films, and independent movies that would never play at a theater near me was vital proof that the world was larger than everyone around me thought it was.
Matt Singer’s Opposable Thumbs: How Siskel & Ebert Changed Movies Forever (2023) is more dutiful than revelatory. That’s primarily because much of S&E’s impact came from a tetchy chemistry that can’t be captured on the page. Readers who never saw them together may wonder what the fuss is about, which is unfortunate; their frequent combative appearances on David Letterman’s show are the reason why the Ed Sullivan Theater has two guest chairs. Singer doesn’t crack the intensely private Siskel—some of Gene’s mean-spirited practical jokes targeting Roger frankly make him look like a dick, but they’re balanced by multiple instances of generosity and compassion—while Ebert has already exuberantly told his own story. Their appearance on the animated sitcom The Critic warrants more than the single throwaway reference it receives; the boys sing on that episode, for crying out loud. Detailing the doomed attempts to keep At the Movies alive in the wake of Siskel’s death threatens to end proceedings on a down note. But Singer rallies with an appendix true to the spirit of the show, listing buried treasures that Siskel, Ebert, and Singer himself all love. Among the movies highlighted are some of my own favorites, like The Silent Partner (1978), Matinee (1993), and Love and Death on Long Island (1997).
What I’m Drinking
Robert Simonson profiles bartender Phil Ward for Grub Street. I’ve been lucky enough to experience Ward’s craftsmanship firsthand, and he has several contemporary classics to his credit including the Oaxaca Old-Fashioned and two of the best riffs on the Last Word, the Division Bell and the Final Ward. I’ve started making another Ward original featured in the article, the Riddler. It’s a simple martini variant that showcases the herbaceous taste of Cocchi Americano.
The Riddler, by Phil Ward (proportions guessed by me)
1 ½ oz. gin
1 ½ oz. Cocchi Americano
5 dashes Angostura bitters
Stir. Strain. No garnish.