The Fall is a story within a story. The story we watch takes place in a Catholic hospital in 1920s Los Angeles. The story being told inhabits desolate and exotic locations all over the world. At the center of the foreground story are an injured stuntman named Roy (Lee Pace) and a young girl with a broken arm named Alexandria (Catinca Untaru). Driving the story being told are a slave, a mystic, an Indian, an explosives expert, Darwin, a masked bandit, and their shared oath to kill the evil Governor Odious.

The two stories are worlds apart, but as they each unfold, we see that both are informed by the other and that the common thread that binds them is one of hopelessness, despair, and, ultimately, the battle between destruction and salvation. At its core, The Fall is a movie about the powerful hold of depression. It is about a desire for death that knows no remedy. And as a person who struggled with depression and suicidal thoughts for years, I have to say that the way the film brings that state of mind to life is amazing.

While it is through the hospital-based storyline that we learn Roy is trying to kill himself, it is through the stories he tells Alexandria that we see what fuels his desire for eternal sleep. The first day they meet, he tells her a short tale about Alexander the Great, lost in the desert with his men, and dying of thirst. One of his men arrives with one helmet-full of water, but knowing that their situation will not be remedied by just that small amount, he dumps it out. "That's stupid," Alexandria says. She would have divided it among the men until it was gone. His look tells us he never even thought of that. Translation: For Alexandria, even the smallest thing is a blessing and a reason to keep going. But for Roy, the fact that he has already given up on anything and everything couldn't be clearer.

The next story Roy tells is the one about the six different men seeking the death of Governor Odious. It is in this tale that Roy reveals just how far-reaching and all-consuming despair can become. Although Roy's depression is repeatedly tied to the loss of a woman, it is as if the story pushes us to recognize that that heartache is only the trigger that set off a much wider sea of despair. As I see it, even though Roy may only play one character in the story, the torture of every character is nothing other than an embodiment of the expansive reach of Roy's own. Two characters in the story deal with the absence of family member. Two with the loss of a lover. One with the loss of his best friend. One character faces life lived without any sort of connection or friendship. Two with the threat of losing the passion for which they have always lived. And two with the destruction of the beauty around them and the joy that it has always brought them.

Just watching Roy's story brought to life, I can see every pain that I struggled with when I was at some of the darkest points of my depression. The sense of being completely alone even when surrounded by others. The feeling that life no longer holds anything of interest or joy at all. The imprisonment of complete inability. The belief that giving up and giving in, no matter how unsatisfying, is truly the only option left.

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