Anatomy of a Fall, the Palme d'Or-winning courtroom drama from director Justine Triet, premieres on Netflix on September 1, 2026. Led by Sandra Hüller, Swann Arlaud, and Milo Machado Graner, the film turns a suspicious death into a vertigo-inducing trial about a couple.
Awarded the Palme d’Or at Cannes 2023, then the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay and six Césars, Anatomy of a Fall has established itself as one of the most talked-about French films of recent years. The feature is written by Justine Triet and Arthur Harari.
Sandra, a German novelist, lives with her husband Samuel and their son Daniel in an isolated chalet near Grenoble. When Samuel is found dead outside the house, investigators hesitate between an accident, suicide, and homicide. Suspicion quickly falls on Sandra, the only other adult in the chalet at the time of the incident.
A year on, his trial begins. Yet the proceedings go beyond the circumstances of the fall. The court scrutinizes Samuel's professional struggles, Sandra's literary success, their intimate life, their grudges, and how they shared the burden of family duties. Their relationship turns into evidence itself, laid bare and interpreted by outsiders.
Daniel, their 11-year-old visually impaired son, plays a pivotal role in the case. Confronted with the adults’ conflicting versions, he must try to piece together what he heard and what he thinks he knows about his parents. Milo Machado Graner embodies this character opposite Sandra Hüller, while Swann Arlaud plays the defense attorney and Antoine Reinartz the prosecutor.
Presented in competition at the Festival de Cannes 2023, Anatomy of a Fall won the Palme d’Or awarded by the jury chaired by Ruben Östlund. Justine Triet thus became the third female director to receive the prize, following Jane Campion and Julia Ducournau.
The film then continued its international run with five nominations at the 2024 Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress. Justine Triet and Arthur Harari won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, a prize also acknowledged at the BAFTAs.
In France, the feature film has scooped six César Awards: Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress for Sandra Hüller, Best Supporting Actor for Swann Arlaud, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Editing for Laurent Sénéchal. Its arrival on Netflix now brings the movie to a new audience, three years after its Cannes debut.
Our take on Anatomy of a Fall
For her fourth feature, Justine Triet delivers another striking performance, once again. Following The Battle of Solferino, Victoria and Sybil, the filmmaker offers a heartfelt tribute to her lead, Sandra Hüller, in a role tailored to the German actress that we could easily have seen winning best actress.
Anatomy of a Fall is a relentless courtroom drama in which Triet redefines a genre that is already highly conventional. Lawyers dissect the couple’s life, laying bare each other’s worst deeds to uncover the truth, all under the gaze of little Daniel, scarred by his father’s death. The role is brilliantly inhabited by Milo Machado Graner, and a testimony on the stand, magnificently staged, places him at the heart of the plot for a few minutes, revealing the full extent of his talent.
Samuel’s death remains an unsolved riddle, and Triet never outright reveals the truth. She and her partner, director Arthur Harari, have crafted a finely chiselled, superbly efficient screenplay. The film gradually morphs into a pure thriller and takes your breath away at its apex—the central couple’s quarrel, presented as a flashback. The direction, the editing of the action, and, above all, the performances of the two leads, elevate this sequence to the pantheon of standout moments in the Cannes official selection and anchor it with a well-deserved Palme d’Or.
The arrival of Anatomy of a Fall on Netflix gives viewers a fresh look at a film that goes beyond simply asking “suicide or homicide?” By placing a couple’s intimate life at the center of the trial, Justine Triet probes how justice, loved ones, and audiences piece together a truth from narratives that are inevitably incomplete.
To go further, check out our guide to Netflix's September new releases, our pick of streaming premieres across all platforms, and our guide “What to watch today on streaming.”
