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LFF 2011: A Dangerous Method

The film itself is in a straitjacket - tightly-wound and emotionless.

With the wealth of talent on display, it's extraordinary to report that A Dangerous Method is a disappointingly staid, flat film.

David Cronenberg, the director who can switch from visceral body horror to compelling drama in a heartbeat; Christopher Hampton, the screenwriter whose script for the complex Atonement was masterful; Viggo Mortensen, whose career post-Lord of the Rings has been electrifying in the hands of Cronenberg; Michael Fassbender, the intense and powerful actor du jour; Keira Knightley, the underrated, highly committed and inuitive actress who rarely makes a misstep.

Those names combined with the story of Carl Jung (Fassbender) and Sigmund Freud's (Mortensen) friendship, and the pivotal relationship between Jung and his patient Sabina Spielrein (Knightley) should make for riveting viewing. However, as the uninspiring trailer ominously indicated, there is little sense of drama or momentum.

Beginning with Jung's fledgling work in psychoanalysis, it kicks off with a crazed Sabina being treated for her hysterics under the care of Jung in 1904. Knightley gives a brave, vanity-free (and factually correct) portrayal of Sabina's physical transformations which is often extreme and uncomfortable to watch. When Sabina's guilty desires are pinpointed to spanking and humiliation, Jung uses her case as a basis for his work using 'the talking cure'. He approaches his mentor Freud with his results, with the film tackling their burgeoning friendship and opposing theories with a staggering lack of interest. Only Mortensen's dry wit keeps the spark alive.

Meanwhile, Jung oversteps his professional boundaries, and begins a blissful affair with the rapidly recovering Sabina, having all her BDSM fantasies fulfilled by a willing Jung and his cane. Knightley shines as the real star of this story, as she juggles the illicit relationship with her own dreams of studying medicine. Fassbender, so outstanding in many features this year, is merely competent with a direction that refuses to go any deeper than surface storytelling. Knightley's provocative passion sadly doesn't bounce off Fassbender's guilty Jung, with the actor having considerably more chemistry with the chaste Mia Wasikowska in Jane Eyre this year (that's if we're not counting James McAvoy in X-Men: First Class).

Vincent Cassell pops up as the lecherous, highly-sexed and bohemian Otto Gross, put into Jung's care at the request of Freud. Gross's theories inspire Jung, and also push him into his inevitable affair with Sabina. Canadian actress Sarah Gadon suffers by comparison to her stellar colleagues, as Jung's wealthy wife and constant bearer of his children. Mrs Jung's own work in psychiatry is barely mentioned.

Along with average production design and cinematography, Cronenberg's pacing is a chore, killing Hampton's deceptively clever script stone dead. It's as if the film itself is in a straitjacket, as tightly-wound and emotionless as it is. As the film's footnotes play, it becomes clear for all of Freud's cigar-chomping and Jung's pipe-smoking, that this was the extraordinary tale of the little-known Spielrein, and that Knightley has given her the depth she deserved.

Rating: 6/10