Three million admissions, a Palme d’Or, five Oscar nominations… Five figures on the worldwide success of the film “Anatomy of a Fall”

This two and a half hour French feature film, directed by Justine Triet, traces the trial of a woman accused of having killed her husband, with the couple’s visually impaired boy and their dog as only witnesses.

A worldwide success. After winning the Palme d’Or at Cannes in May, the French film Anatomy of a fall, directed by Justine Triet, was nominated in five categories at the Oscars on Tuesday January 23, before collecting 11 nominations at the César on Wednesday. This two and a half hour feature film traces the trial of a woman, played by German Sandra Hüller, accused of having killed her husband, with the couple’s visually impaired boy and their dog as only witnesses.

These nominations are far from being the first proof of the success of the film, with three million admissions worldwide. Franceinfo looks back at five figures which testify to the enthusiasm for the director’s fourth feature film.

1 Nearly three million cinema admissions worldwide

The spectators’ verdict is final. Anatomy of a fall has accumulated 1.3 million cinema admissions in France as of January 24. It’s better than the last tricolor Palmes d’Or, like Titanium by Julia Ducournau (2021), The Life of Adele by Abdellatif Kechiche (2013) or Dheepan by Jacques Audiard (2015). But less good thanBetween the walls by Laurent Cantet, who attracted 1.6 million spectators in 2008.

The film also had 1.6 million admissions outside France, thanks to programming in some 60 countries, according to Unifrance. In the United States, it was released in more than 500 theaters and grossed four million dollars. It was also released in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. And former US President Barack Obama cited it in his favorite films of 2023.

2 A Palme d’Or and two Golden Globes

The feature film has already won around ten awards. Thanks to him, Justine Triet became, at 45, the third director in history to win the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, after Jane Campion (The piano lesson1993) and Julia Ducournau (Titanium2021).

The director then took advantage of the Cannes platform to cross swords with the government. She had notably accused the head of state of having a “dominant power, more and more uninhibited”and criticized the executive for having “shockingly denied” the protest against pension reform. She had also defended independent cinema in the face of liberalism: without the cultural exception, which she accused the government of wanting “to break”, “I won’t be here today”, she said when receiving the most coveted prize in the seventh art. In return, Emmanuel Macron did not send him a message of congratulations.

Eight months later, Justine Triet’s film won two Golden Globes: best screenplay and best foreign language film. Emmanuel Macron then said to himself “proud to see French cinema rewarded”in a message on the social network

These awards seemed to surprise the director. The film “is too long, the characters talk all the time, there’s no music, a couple breaks up, a dog vomits, that’s what…”she quipped when receiving the statuette for best original screenplay.

3 A Palm Dog attributed to the dog in the film

The film also won an original award. During the 76th Cannes Film Festival, he won… the prize for best canine performance. “Snoop plays an essential role in the plot and particularly impressed the jury during a dramatic scene in which he simulated the illness in a very convincing manner. Snoop has all the makings of a big star”underlined in a press release the organizers of this independent prize, awarded since 2001.

Snoop is a border collie. It was not him in person, but another border collie named Susie who accepted the prize in his place on the Croisette, reports HuffPost.

4 Five Oscar nominations and 11 César nominations

The feature film obtained five nominations for the Oscars on Tuesday, which will take place on the night of March 10 to 11: best film, best direction, best original screenplay, best editing and best actress. Justine Triet thus becomes the ninth woman to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director. “I’m very moved. I thought that we would only be nominated for the screenplay, surely, but I hadn’t really imagined that. I’m very touched, it’s a great joy”confided the director to franceinfo.

This success is all the more decisive as the film was not chosen by France to compete for the Oscar for best international film. Anatomy of a fall had been snubbed in favor of The Passion of Dodin Bouffant – a choice which now sounds like a failure given the non-selection of this film by the Academy of Oscars.

The film also received 11 César nominations on Wednesday: best direction, best film, best actress, best supporting actor (one for Swann Arlaud and one for Antoine Reinartz), best male revelation, best original screenplay, best sound, best editing, best photo, best scenery.

A year after an all-male “best director” selection, Justine Triet is on track to become, on February 23, the second female director in the history of French cinema to be crowned, after Tonie Marshall for Venus Beauty (Institute)in 2000.

5 A montage from a Swann Arlaud fan seen more than a million times on Twitter

The performance of French actor Swann Arlaud, who plays the role of lawyer Vincent Renzi, stirred up American moviegoers, who raved about his physique and charisma on social networks, noted BFMTV.

The actor, doubly Caesarized for Little Peasant (best actor) and Thanks to God (best supporting actor), but relatively little known to the general public, is at the heart of several dozen viral videos (or “fancams”) compiling his appearances in Anatomy of a fall. The montage, produced by a film buff and used in these various videos, has been viewed more than a million times on Twitter alone.

“I usually make montages on fictional characters or actors to influence the people who follow me to watch a film or seriesshe told BFMTV. I had made videos that worked well before but not to this level. Especially for an actor already not very well known by the general French public to go viral like that internationally, it’s very surprising”. Such a success across the Atlantic that the American distributor of the film relayed the video to promote the feature film.