I recently watched A Dangerous Method, a film about Carl Jung, Sigmund Freud, and Sabina Spielrein. Going into this movie, I was very excited about watching it. I was sold on the sole fact that it was the third straight collaboration between Viggo Mortensen and David Cronenberg, including Mortensen's Oscar-nominated turn in Eastern Promises. Then, there was the fact that it was a film about Jung and Freud, two brilliant thinkers. Just to see the embodiment of these minds would have been an experience in and of itself, but with the pedigree of the actors (Mortensen, Michael Fassbender, Keira Knightley), it seemed like this would be one of the best movies of the year. This film is essentially Oscar bait anyway.
I will admit that parts of me wanted to see this film at the Oscars. The dialogue between all of the characters was interesting and packed with intricacy. While the subject matter may be too advanced for some moviegoers, it was always fun to listen to the technicalities and methodology that resounded in each sentence. The acting was similarly impressive. Mortensen truly disappeared into his role as the father of psychoanalysis, and Fassbender played Jung with a subdued intensity that could have been misconstrued as boredom or blandness if acted by an inferior actor. Vincent Cassel, as Otto Gross, added a breath of life into a very serious film. And while Knightley's performance was at times too extreme, it did what was necessary and turned many scenes with her into this uncomfortable and, in a way, humiliating experience, something that the film likely aimed to do.
But, I was woefully disappointed at the stagnancy of the film. Admittedly, my sights may have been set too high after the very active A History of Violence and Eastern Promises, but it was not just the scenery that need to be kinetic. The story moved at a glacial pace, which is never good if it is a shorter movie (about an hour and a half). Part of the problem was the artistic decisions by the director. Because this film dealt with psychoanalysis, I should not have expected movement in every single scene. But more often than not, the scene was limited to one area, and the film moved forward through jumps, never making a truly smooth transition between one point to another. While there were interesting parts of the movie (particularly the string of letters between Spielrein, Freud, and Jung near the end), characters were very motionless. Even while they were moving around, it felt that they were going nowhere. This could be a clever ploy by Cronenberg to assimilate the audience into the film by creating a sense of idleness through the closed-off settings and stalled plot. But that seemed to be too intelligent for most directors this side of David Lynch. Cronenberg fails to send the plot in any direction, preferring to keep everything in a little contained box. He, in a way, is much like Freud, not willing to take any risks. Both seemed to be content strengthening the basis of the movie, rather than reaching out and grabbing something potentially better. Could these risks have led to more negative results as Freud would assume? Yes, it could have. But as the director of a film with so much potential in the first place, he should not fear these uncertainties.
This was a great movie, but it is too artsy for its own good. It never plays out like a movie in the typical sense. It is more like a play. It jumps from scene to scene without much understanding as to what is going on between each of them. The setting rarely changes in a scene, preferring multiple changes rather than one fluid motion throughout the film. Nevertheless, it is well-acted and well-written. But Cronenberg unfortunately errs on the side of caution. He creates a serious movie that takes no risks. His movie could be interpreted at the field of psychoanalysis that he presents. It is a solid field with substance, but it is so rooted in one thing that it never branches out. Cronenberg takes too few risks and creates what will likely be an award-winning movie, which is sad because it could have been more than that. If he only had Jung's ambition and creativity, it could have been a modern classic.
