MovieChat Forums > Anatomie d'une chute (2024) Discussion > Pretty lame movie, better watch its grea...

Pretty lame movie, better watch its great inspiration "Anatomy of a Murder" (1959)!

posted 9 months ago by Alessandro (108)
3 replies | jump to latest

Everything negative has already been said about this two and a half hour snoozefest, so I decided to rewatch the original inspiration for this (beginning with its title!), master director Otto Preminger's "Anatomy of a Murder", with James Stewart and Lee Remick, accompanied not by 50 Cent's "P.I.M.P." steel drums but cool jazz by Duke Ellington.

Of course it's not a direct copy of the plot, here it's no fall to the death but a rape victim's husband shooting the rapist, but the similarities are clear: Will the husband be acquitted or sentenced in this extensive courtroom drama (it's even 10 minutes longer than "Fall")?

And what is "truth" anyway? To what degree is it "constructed" in court, especially by the language used - different languages used in the trial seem to matter to a degree in "Fall", uttering practically unheard-of words like "climax", "spermatogenesis" or even "panties" cause controversy in "Murder"?

It even has a scene with overly loud music playing at the beginning so they can't have a conversation! I had to laugh when I saw that scene!

NB: Did I forget to mention a cute dog plays a little role?

[–] sonans (1543) 8 months ago

Anatomy of a Murder is a terrible movie in this day and age of countless true crime documentaries.

I can understand why the movie was a big deal back then, because ordinary people has no access to courtroom. Now? I can click on youtube and netflix watch documentaries of more interesting and terrible crimes. A man shots a man? Yawn~

[–] joi2049 (5561) 8 months ago

ANATOMY of a MURDER is a wonderful film ... watched it a couple of weeks or so ago on TMC. Also found lots of really interesting reviews of it as well. The Criterion Collection, for example, was one of them.

https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/2155-anatomy-of-a-murder-atomization-of-a-murder

the truism goes, Hollywood gets everything wrong with stunning regularity. The rare exception is Otto Preminger’s Anatomy of a Murder (1959), widely considered among the finest trial films ever made, and maybe more universally loved by law students than by cineastes.

Here's another link:

https://the-artifice.com/anatomy-of-a-murder-art-observation/

Anatomy of A Murder: The Art of Observation

Otto Preminger’s Anatomy of a Murder is more than just a film dealing with the court system: it stands as a realistic and meticulous observation of American life at the time. It was adapted from John D. Voelker’s novel that he had based on a real story in which he was the defense attorney, and Preminger was careful to depict the affair close to how the real case had been conducted. The theme of observation is developed in every aspect of the film. The director aimed to observe and depict the legal system in a scientific and realistic way. In the story, characters observe each other and all are aware that the way they appear will build a specific image of them, and will impact the way they are judged in the trial. Finally, the theme of observation is also developed in the film’s style through Preminger’s observing camerawork which encourages the audience to examine every detail in the film in order to construct their own opinion and meaning of the case, like a real jury

[–] KBiker (980) 8 months ago

I was thinking the same thing, while I tried to watch this excruciating tale. Anatomy of a Murder was a great, entertaining movie about "Did he (Ben Gazzara) do it or not?". This film? Annoying. I only got about 1/3 of the way through before I turned it off.