The moment the husband grabs a pillow, I knew the film was about to lose me. When he smothers his wife, Haneke greatly oversteps his bounds and remystifies dying.

Amour sets up certain rules of being uncinematic in its portrayal of dying. Then it gives us an extremely cinematic way of killing someone. The pillow smother is something out of a gangster film. The person being smothered kicks and squirms, until motion is no more. It's very visual.

First, there's the technical problem. A pillow smother is almost impossible to do, since people can often breathe through fabric. But even if successful, once the body ceases motion, that does not mean that the person is dead. Due to lack of oxygen, the person could've slipped into shock or coma. Smothering by pillow is a movie trope. It's not a reliable way to off someone. And I feel this is important due to how close Haneke wants to play with realism.

But worse than the actual mechanics of a smothering by pillow, the move completely derails the film's raison d'etre. The film works for over 100 minutes to demystify dying and beautifully so. Yet the pillow smother begins the process by which Haneke re-mythologizes dying.

Cache works allegorically and terrifyingly as myth. The White Ribbon works epically as myth. Amour does not work as myth. Simply compare how they're shot.

At one point, the daughter character asks the husband, "What happens next?"

To which he answers, (paraphrasing), "The same thing that's been happening, until it stops."

It's a graceful and simple way to say how people actually die of old age in the real world. And it would've made a heart-breaking end to this tale.

Yet Haneke fires this film out of the real world as if from a cannon. Because in the real world, barely a single person dies by pillow smother. Even if the film wanted to finalize the process of dying by euthanasia, that could work. But it must work in the same way that the rest of the film does. By taking the ordinary and demystifying it.

Now, you may wonder why I am against un-realism. I am not. But a film is a success when it plays by its own rules. Haneke breaking his docudrama rules to spill over into melodrama is refusing to play by the rules that he set up. Imagine Denzel Washington in Training Day suddenly breaking into a bullet-time Matrix dodge. It just doesn't work within the rules of the film.

And a couple more missteps show that Haneke's intention is, against the will of the film itself, to mythologize the story. Because right after the husband euthanizes his wife, Haneke brings back the metaphorical bird in the house. On its own, this is fine, but Haneke continues to pile on.

Next Haneke begins filming the man's ritual (implied) suicide. The film becomes much like The Seventh Continent, as that family prepares for their demise. Again, this is not how most people deal with living or dying, and, as such, feels very counter to the objectives of the first 100 minutes of the film.

And then Haneke again egregiously oversteps by having the husband see his wife and leave the home with her spirit/memory. My own philosophical objections to this scene aside, the person who rejoins their lover's spirit/memory is just cinematic cliche at this point. And it plays that way.

There is a naturalism established early by the film, and it deserves much better than the movie cliches we are given at the end. Unfortunately, the greatest love is ultimately Haneke's love for myth-making, and it just doesn't fit here.

And then Haneke again egregiously oversteps by having the husband see his wife and leave the home with her spirit/memory. My own philosophical objections to this scene aside, the person who rejoins their lover's spirit/memory is just cinematic cliche at this point. And it plays that way.

One idea I had regarding this final scene, is that it could be read as a strange reversal, wherein the caretaker becomes, if only for a brief moment, the victim. Notice how Riva takes the reigns with her husband, telling him to hurry it up, get his coat, put his shoes on, etc. Throughout the entire scene, Trintignant remains curiously silent. It suddenly came to me as an idea that Trintignant had in fact been the one inching towards the death the whole time, with the preceding film having consisted of a space in which he is able to construct himself as the caretaker, as the one in charge of making ethical decisions. In this space there is the possibility of a kind of fabricated, glorified stoicism, but there is also the possibility of weakness/hyperbole, i.e. the pillow scene.

I absolutely agree with you that the idea that Trintigant is also creeping towards death is intended to be noticed by the audience. Especially in light of the second bird entering the home. But personally, I still can't help by feel that his final scene undercuts the power of this sentiment.

While consistent with the prior dream sequences, the visualization of a reunion of with his wife saps the act of dying of its power. After all, are the stakes not drastically lowered when Death is a way to reunite with Riva?

Also, Trintigant wants to die. Riva asks to die as well, which I believe happens way too early in the narrative. I think it's much more honest if characters don't want to die, at least until they are in extreme pain.

If a character doesn't want to die, yet ultimately must give in to the inexorable process of aging, that is a film that is beginning to be honest about Death. Because people don't just die when they want to or when they're ready to. People die everyday and fight tooth and nail not to.

What is so terrifying is ultimately that, unlike any other narrative complications, Death is the one thing that we will never be able to overcome. By presenting characters who (1) welcome it and (2) are visualized as reuniting, I feel it slips into mythologizing, which runs counter to the demystification and sheer banality of dying presented in the first half.

And while I agree Trintigant does inch closer to death throughout the film (indeed he is aging), the representation of that is such a false mythology in contrast to the harrowing naturalism of the first 100 minutes. Even the way he exits stage right is a denial of the process of aging.

But the indignity of dying is the violence of the body against itself. The indignity is not the violence of a pillow against your face. And the indignity is not walking hand-in-hand with a loved one into that cold night.

To digress a bit, this makes three Palme d'Or winners in a row which visualize some sort of reunion after death, whether through reincarnation (Uncle Boonmee), New Age beach Heaven (Tree of Life), or metaphorical dream sequence (Amour).

As stated, I think Amour's focus is on the process of dying (separate from Death itself). But that said, is it too much to ask for a film to be honest about Death? To represent it as something that happens even when we are not ready for it. That dying is not only horrible and painful, but it does not ultimately lead to reunion and reconciliation.

Or is the power of Death so overwhelming that even our alleged "cold and logical" filmmaker, Michael Haneke, must attempt to soften its blow?

(all of a sudden, he's getting soft?)

by mimicking "Last Year at Marienbad"),