A Dangerous Method

A very interesting film, though I can't work out why it was made. A Dangerous Method stars Michael Fassbender and Viggo Mortenssen as the psychologists Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. The film is a fictional account of the interactions that these giants of their field had in the each part of the 20th century. At the time each was developing his own theory of psychoanalysis and looking for people upon which to test his ideas. Both men were convinced that human sexuality has a massive impact on the the study of psychoanalysis, but they differed on the extent to which it is the critical factor.

To turn this into an actual story rather than a tecious back and forth of letters arguing about human sexuality, the film muses upon the posibility of one of Jung's historical protegees being his secret lover. Keira Knightley plays Sabrina Spielrein, a young Russian woman who is brought into Jung's assylum and who is helped to deal with her childhood traumas via the medium of getting spanked by Jung. She then goes on to get a university education and become a prominent psychoanalist in her own right.

So this is another high profile film with high profile cast members that Keira Knightley's in. If ever an actress blew hot and cold in her films then it is Ms Knightley. Maybe this is going to sound unfair to her, or maybe now I've got it into my head I can't get it out, but whenever she's on screen she looks like she's 'doing acting' rather than it coming naturally to her. She's not helped here because her first scene requires her to gurn madly at the camera as the crazy Sabrina while Jung sits behind her trying to diagnose her mental state. Being convincingly mad sounds hard enough for an actor at the best of times, but when it's the opening scene in the movie for someone who's acting skills I'm not convinced by and they're trying to establish the character - it's very very hard indeed. Sure she's trying her best and doing a better job than I could, but I can't get over the realisation that she's an actress playing a role, it's a problem that seriously diminishes the impact of what she's doing, has a negative impact on the character she's playing and the film overall.

While watching the film I had no idea at all about the historical accuracy of what was going on, which prompted me to look things up afterwards. If you watch the film I encourage you to do the same. Jung's interest in psychic phenomena is something I had very little concept of.

Though the film is about an interesting subject matter and has a central trio of characters that form an interesting relationship - the film is nothing more than merely interesting. It's not really entertainment, doesn't really have a story or an arc in the traditional sense and as such I'm not really sure why it's a film at all.  It could easily have been a Discovery channel production. If you're interested in psychology you'll probably get a lot more out of this than I did, or if you're a fan of Mr Fassbender (as I am) it's yet another solid performance from him to enjoy. If you're looking for a film to be entertained by, probably best steer clear.