The key sequence in the procedural courtroom drama Anatomy of a Fall is indicative of director Justine Triet’s masterful storytelling for what it doesn’t show us. The man who suffers the fatal titular fall, Samuel, made a surreptitious audio recording of a vicious argument between he and his wife, Sandra, that ultimately turns physically violent.
As the jury hears this altercation, Triet allows us to see what they can’t. She stages the heated exchange as a flashback, but only the portion where words are used as weapons. Before the first slap is doled out, Triet cuts back to the courtroom. We experience the physical violence between Samuel and Sandra as the jury does, who can only hear the wordless scuffle with no way of knowing who is doing what to whom.