Psychoanalytic Literary Criticism on The Corpse of Anna Fritz

Jarmaine T. Alcantara
ABM 11-11, Senior High School Department,
Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Manila

The 2015 Spanish thriller film, The Corpse of Anna Fritz, embodies a mental disorder
called necrophilia. Necrophilia, also called thanatophilia, is a sexual attraction or sexual act
involving corpses.1 This realistic revenge thriller story involves three men with different
personalities and ideologies, and the way they responded to the urgent situation between facing
the consequence of their acts or getting away with it are all subject to psychoanalysis.
Our personalities are shaped by enduring conflict between our impulses to do whatever
we like and our restraint to control these impulses. 2 There are four significant characters in this
movie: Ivan, Pau, Javi, and of course Anna Fritz, the 'corpse' herself. Using Sigmund Freud's
psychoanalytic theory of personality, one can argue that the Ivan, Pau and Javi represents the
three components of the mind: id, ego, and the superego, respectively. Anna Fritz, on the other
hand, symbolizes the impulse that creates trouble between the three components.
As the impulse or the sexual urge, specifically, was presented, Ivan reflects his id, the hidden
fetish of having sex with a dead actress. Pau becomes the superego that is ideal, and is real which
contradicts the id, contradicting what Ivan wants to commit. As Javi, the ego, tries to mediate
between the two, Ivan overpowers him. Javi let the id take control, leading to the conflict. As
they try to choose between killing the girl or not, Pau tried to be ideal leading to Ivan's sudden
aggression, leading to Pau's accidental death, portraying the loss of the superego. Javi, on the
other hand, wants to do the more convenient act that his conscious mind thinks is, which is to get
away with the crime, but somewhere deep in his unconscious mind, he struggles and proceeds to
help the poor Anna Fritz.
The different responses of the three men are driven by impulse and emotion alone
because of being drunk. They become themselves without inhibitions. Generally, when we are
drunk, the deeper parts of our brain where emotions and impulses come from make us act
more like primitive and instinctive beings, but that's not 'who we are'. If anything, that's almost
like peeling back what makes us 'us' and exposing the animal driving it all. 3 The two men who
raped Anna Fritz may have had the hidden desire with dead bodies but always have their ego to
keep them in check, but when an opportunity opened, they let the id, which contains sexual and
aggressive drives, and it's pleasure principle: an impulse that should be satisfied immediately,
defeat their ego and commit a necrophilic act that is not ideal nor acceptable to the society.

1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necrophilia
2 www.simplypsychology.org/psychoanalysis.html
3 http://www.healthguidance.org/entry/17127/1/Does-Your-True-Self-Come-Out-When-Youre-Drunk.html