Nothing Dangerous in Obsessing Over Cronenberg’s Method
In 1904, 18-year-old Russian-born Jew Sabina Spielrein (Keira Knightley) is sent by her parents to Zurich to be put under the care of 29-year-old psychiatrist Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender). A devotee of the great Sigmund Freud (Viggo Mortensen), the driven doctor sees this new patient as the perfect candidate to test out the theory of psychoanalysis, or ‘the talking cure,’ on, sure success with her will earn him acclaim as we as maybe even at some point grant him audience with his esteemed mentor.
Keira Knightley and Michael Fassbender in A Dangerous Method
© Sony Pictures Classics
Nine years are covered in director David Cronenberg’s A Dangerous Method, nearly a decade of material chronicling the psychoanalytical concepts championed by Freud, embraced by Jung and used upon Spielrein to great success. The movie is clinical chronicle of this success, the price it had on the two men’s friendship and the tragedies that afflicted all three because of it. It is an examination of how some rise above, heal and make something of themselves while others refuse to let petty differences fall to wayside, how they ultimately drive the kind of intractable wedge which leads only to misery.
At first, such a film doesn’t seem like it would fit in the Cronenberg canon, that it would have little in common with the likes of Scanners, The Fly, Dead Ringers, A History of Violence or Eastern Promises. Those initial glances, however, would be wrong, for as clinically delivered and as antiseptic as much of the film is its foray into the world of human sexuality and how that ties into the psyche is just as much at the core of this story as it is The Brood or Videodrome. In many ways, this film can almost be construed as the director’s most insidious and disturbing drama yet, the carcasses left strewn upon the ideological battlefield at the end of this one as tragically devastating as they come.
Not that saying this means the picture is a total success. It is measured. It is paced like a ticking metronome. It is as prim and as proper as the men it is depicting and the era in which they live in. Much like Louis Malle’s My Dinner with Andre it is a story of talk, of discussion and of debate, and while there are moments of raw sexual ferocity overall the whole thing is nothing more than brief dialogue-driven windows into a pair of psychoanalytical titans ultimately doing their best to convince the other, a former friend, that they are wrong.
Academy Award-winning writer Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liaisons) , adapting both his own play The Talking Cure as well as Jonathan Kerr’s book A Most Dangerous Method, is the man behind the screenplay, and as such it is no surprise the resulting film is as theatrical as it is. The whole thing at times feels like it has been performed and photographed upon a Broadway stage and not upon spectacularly realized sets and picture-perfect exterior locales, giving the proceedings a stodginess Cronenberg can never quite escape.
As the same time I get the feeling this is all on purpose, that the mood and the milieu the director has so fastidiously crafted is all part of his grand design. For as remote as much of this can feel, truth be told there was never a second where I could take my eyes off of the screen. I couldn’t wait to hear what our three principles would say next, was intrigued to know how an exclamation from one could affect the outlook of the others. Every word would hang in the air like a dagger perilously on the verge of falling, every action a hand grenade ready to blow those trapped within its blast to smithereens. Obsession, intellect, tenacity, education, exploration, ego, fallacy, experimentation; each collides one into the other in a way that is as dynamic as it is destructive, everything coming together to make the final scenes a haunting coda to truths to horrible to talk about yet too familiar to be able to turn away from.
Fassbender has had a remarkable year, and between this, X-Men: First Class, Jane Eyre and especially Shame someone should give him a lifetime achievement award for his work in 2011 alone. Mortensen, even with limited screen time to make an impression, nearly equals him, his penultimate scenes as he deals with his own mortality, what it is he’s accomplished and the effect his work has had on those most important to him – whether they be friend, like Jung, or his own family – is rather incredible.
But as good as they are, A Dangerous Method belongs to Knightley It is Sabina who goes through the greatest transformation, it is her journey that Cronenberg and Hampton are most interested in showcasing, and as such the actress rises to the occasion in a way bordering on spectacular. Her performance more than just the jutting of her jaw and the contortion of her body, it is instead the discovery of peace in tranquility within a psyche that has never known either. Her vocal inflections, her facial moments, the way she becomes Sabina body and soul, all if it enthralling, her story the unshakable one of triumph and heartache that lingered with me countless days after I had watched the film.
It seems obvious Cronenberg’s latest will not be for everyone, but all the same it is a risky and thought-provoking endeavor I couldn’t urge viewers to take a chance on more vociferously. While I wasn’t at all sure what I thought of the picture as a whole as I exited the theatre, truth be told it is one I’ve taken great pleasure in pondering ever since that initial viewing and one in many respects I cannot wait to see again. A Dangerous Method is dry, it is clinical, but is also universal, this decade in the life of psychological titans as pertinent and as vital to review in the here and now of today as it likely was back in the early days of the twentieth century when it was originally taking place.
Film Rating: êêê (out of 4)
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