Anatomy of a Fall finally hit cinemas in Singapore this month, which means I was harassing my friends for weeks prior about buying tickets and catching it with me. As is standard, I didn’t know a thing about the film apart from that it was nominated for several Oscars, won a Palme d’Or, and picked up two awards at the Golden Globes. I don’t like to spoil films for myself, so I often don’t even watch trailers beforehand – a friend whose taste I trust, or a critic I follow on Twitter, saying it’s worth a watch is usually enough to convince me.
So when I settled in my seat to watch, I had no idea that its suffocating, isolating portrayal of family was going to quickly turn into one of the most gripping legal dramas I’ve ever seen. I’ve never been much of a fan of this genre. I watched some of Better Call Saul, a couple seasons of Suits and How To Get Away With Murder, and quite a lot of Law and Order as a child, but they never gripped me. I’m not as interested in the lawyers doing the lawyering as I am in the case itself. I want to know everything about the people actually involved in the purported crime.
Anatomy of a Fall ticked all the boxes for me and had me leaning forward in my seat, hands pressed to my cheeks, eyes wide. The movie is fascinating to me, personally, because like the main character, I am a writer. As the movie dissected her marriage, how her success as a writer affected her relationship with her husband, and even had a lawyer suggest that what she wrote in fiction could represent her feelings in real life, I felt more and more invested because I had my own nuanced, anecdotal arguments to make. The movie’s dark humour poked fun at the justice system as it humanised the people involved in the case, and explored the process of evidence collection and putting arguments together long after the alleged crime itself had occurred.
Now, I’m going to briefly pivot and tell you that a few years ago, my partner refurbished one of his old Nintendo handhelds and bought a bunch of game cartridges online as a gift for me. He knew I’d never owned a Nintendo console from that era, and so he gave me a way to experience the games he’d played two decades prior. One of the games he’d bought that I played around with was Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, but I never got very far. There were other things to play, and I figured I’d find time at some point to go back and finish it. Then it became my full-time job to play games as they came out and write about them, and Ace Attorney plummeted in my priorities.
What I liked about Ace Attorney, though, and the reason I thought about it after watching Anatomy of a Fall, was that I got to be the detective.This is the second time this month I’m writing about loving solving murders, so you know it’s true. In the game, it was my job to pick apart the crime scene, my job to interview the suspects, and my job to convince the court that my client couldn’t or wouldn’t possibly have done the thing they were accused of. It’s fun, and it’s funny. It’s a classic for a reason.
Watching the court in Anatomy of a Fall reenact the moments before the crime to confirm if things could have happened the way witnesses said they did gave me that familiar itch to go solve some cases myself. Watching the lawyers bicker and make pithy jokes also reminded me of when my short time with Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney made me snort with laughter. In this line of work, it’s easy to always be looking to the next game, but Anatomy of a Fall reminded me that there are legal dramas out there for me, and I already own one.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy
WHERE TO PLAY
The Ace Attorney Trilogy comprises Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, as well as the first two sequels, Justice For All, and Trials and Tribulations. The visual novels put you in the role of several defense attorneys, investigating cases and defending clients in court.
