An 80-year-old man with advancing dementia feels his world coming apart. Familiar faces change, rooms rearrange and he can no longer trust the order of events in his own life. Florian Zeller adapts his own stage play into a film that puts you entirely inside Anthony's failing perception.
The Father is a 2020 drama film directed by Florian Zeller. This breakdown covers 5 techniques (3 cinematography, 1 narrative and 1 psychology), each with the scene where you can see it. If you like how it is made, A Streetcar Named Desire uses several of the same techniques.
Shooting almost the whole film in 1 confined place. Set design and camera movement keep it visually interesting, and the space itself takes on meaning as the story goes on.
How this film uses it
Almost the entire film takes place inside the apartment, but the apartment changes a little between scenes. Furniture moves and rooms are laid out differently. The same space turns into several spaces depending on Anthony's state.
Where to see it
The bedroom door. Anthony opens what he believes is his bedroom door and finds himself in an unfamiliar room. His own home betrays him, and it plays like a horror scene.
Telling the story through a character you can't trust, because they are lying, mentally unwell or fooling themselves. At some point, you have to rethink what you were told.
How this film uses it
The whole film is filtered through Anthony's broken perception. Faces change between shots and conversations repeat with different people in them. You experience dementia from the inside and lose the outside view you would normally watch it from.
Where to see it
The repeated scene of Anne entering with a different face. Like Anthony, you can't be certain which version is real.
Taking away, piece by piece, any way of telling truth from delusion. A character's whole understanding of events falls apart, and you end up just as lost.
How this film uses it
Zeller never gives the audience a stable reality. There is no objective version of events to check Anthony's confusion against. You go through the same crisis dementia causes, where you no longer know what is true.
Where to see it
The final sequence in the care home. You can't tell Anthony's confusion about his mother apart from his grief, and you can't work out the order the real events happened in.
Shrinking the space the characters have as the film goes on, from open places down to cramped hiding spots. The smaller their world gets, the more pressure you feel.
How this film uses it
The apartment gets less recognizable bit by bit. Paintings disappear, furniture changes position and rooms that existed are gone. That is, Anthony's world is shrinking as dementia strips the familiar out of it.
Where to see it
The late-film apartment scenes. The place has become as bare as a hospital, with the objects gathered over a lifetime removed one by one.
Holding a close-up on an actor's face long enough to catch tiny changes in expression. You read what the character is thinking from details a wider shot would miss.
How this film uses it
Anthony Hopkins's face is pretty much the whole film. Zeller stays on it through the confusion, the clear moments and the sudden childlike terror. Each tiny change of expression lets you see into a mind that is dissolving.
Where to see it
The final scene, where Anthony cries for his mother. Hopkins is held in a long close-up, and the dignity of the performance makes the loss unbearable.
Questions
The Father: quick answers
What filmmaking techniques does The Father use?
CineCode breaks down 5 techniques in The Father (2020): Single-Location Cinematography, Unreliable Narrator, Epistemic Collapse, Spatial Contraction and Deliberate Close-Up Performance.
Who directed The Father?
Florian Zeller directed The Father, released in 2020. CineCode also covers The Son (2022).
What films are similar to The Father?
Films that share techniques with The Father include A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), Das Boot (1981), Chinatown (1974), Marriage Story (2019).
Is there a video breakdown of The Father?
Yes. There is a short video breakdown of The Father on the CineCode YouTube channel, embedded on this page.
