Customer Reviews

Freud

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The problem with older BBC productions - this one was filmed in 1984 - is that they seem to have been filmed through a gauze curtain. The color is washed out. The film switches from outdoors to mostly stage sets and it is hard to become involved with characters when these factors distance you from the story. The nuances of the acting are often lost, even with as fine an actor as David Suchet. Another problem with this particular mini-series is that the story switches from the dying Freud to the young lover to the lab to the friend to the mentor, on and on, without explaining much. I have read about Freud and read his own works, taught his theories and watched documentaries on him, so I knew what was going on in the story. But I can see those who are coming to Freud's life for the first time being terribly confused as to who these people are and what is going on. I gave it three stars for David Suchet. He did get an award for this role. My advice: Rent it first if you're interested.

The more knowledge of Freud you have before watching this talkative docudrama, the more absorbing you may find it. Writer Carey Harrison (son of Rex Harrison and Lilli Palmer) presents the pioneering psychoanalyst from age 28 to 83, struggling to launch his career, marrying, embracing cocaine, evolving daring theories and arguing with his opponents, having a chaste relationship with his sister in law, moving for his last 15 months of life to England beyond the Nazi threat. This project is tagged as revealing Freud "warts and all," including his "suspected homosexuality." One waits in vain for a strong narrative drive, warm humanizing emotions, the arc of drama, but the six segments have a sameness of tone. Freud mostly seems to be on the job.

Each of the six installments is framed by simple scenes of feeble Freud in his English residence during the last day or two of his existence. Indeed, David Suchet is at his most moving here, in heavy makeup: restless gray lips speaking with difficulty because of the large prosthesis in his mouth ravaged by 16 years of operations for cancer. The prolonged suffering, with Freud continuing to work and smoke, has no part in Harrison's script!, or at least in the final film. Though the film was shot in sequence in the studio, all of this scattered "last day" footage was conglomerated into the last three days of shooting.

The filming took eight months, including location work in the countryside and ancient ruins. Beyond Suchet's indefatigable excellence in fulfilling the script's (too narrow) demands, I was intrigued by three other performances: Michael Kitchen as deathstruck addicted Fleischl (not Fleiss) who exudes a wild poetry; Miriam Margolyes as the plump Baroness, hysterical in both senses of the word, an oasis of genuine comedy in this overall dark exercise; and Michael Pennington as the Swiss Jung, tall and loud, reminiscent of a brash American--he's a bright spot too, until he has to switch gears.

Everyone remains suffocatingly clothed, except for two startling moments: (1) Fleischl, high, morose, labile, suddenly rises naked from the tub and throws his arms around Freud's neck. (2) A line of very young girls and boys, covered only from waist to hip, are to be examined by Dr. Freud; as he places his hands here and there on a pretty little girl's innocent flesh, there seems something sensuous in his manner.

Program 6 incorporates a montage of extracts from earlier sequences, sometimes imparting changed meanings, as if Freud's memories are gushing haphazardly. One may surmise that such cannot be strictly scripted, but is the outcome of debate among director, writer, and editor. The close of the film may seem prolonged: Freud's request for his doctor, the blessed shot of morphine, Freud's joking about the flies to come. He does not want his wife present, he speaks a brief message for daughter Anna. Then several recollections affirm his achievement and enduring reputation. The drama was shot tv camera-to-tape in the studio and the location sequences were filmed in 16mm, the present offering now exhibiting subdued color and slightly overexposed effect. So just adjust the parameters for the tv image.
Suchet's 35 minute interview (January 2010) is revelatory and entertaining. The subtitles are not foreign, but for the hearing impaired. Harrison's novelized version (1958) of the script is still available, mostly second hand.

With some faded university knowledge background on Freud (about 30 years ago) I watched this movie three years ago, rented from Blockbuster at that time. Sinse then would return to it in my thoughts again and again. It is deep, sophisticated, it is mesmerizing. I loved it. Wanted to rent again through netflix and then thought that I should buy it, because this is a type of movie you come back to, it is too philosophical and penetrating to ignore and forget.

'Enjoyed this mini-series very much. Having a little background re Freud is helpful. The acting and era recreation ane both very fine. If you are a fan of Hercule P. [Agatha Christie's detective] ,it is interesting to see D. Suchet in this role. The extra interviews and discussions are great, too.

I absolutely loved this series! Yes, it does have flaws - but it has so many great things to offer that really it outweighs the bad.

Suchet's Freud is thoroughly convincing. He shows us a Freud with warts and all; at times unlikeable but always admirable. Above all, the script lives up to Freud's vast intellect. I found myself constantly rewinding so I could soak in all the penetrating quotes and ideas, which fly at you like sharp arrows, one after another. It merits multiple viewing.

Yes it has its dull moments - and I strongly felt that starting with disc 2 the series takes a steady drop in content - the final episode being nothing short of pointless. But this is a magnificent series nonetheless. However, it's only for those like me who love Freud, have read at least one of his books, and are interested in the subject; otherwise I'm sure it will seem like torture, ha ha.

In the mid-70s, the BBC produced this six-part mini-series on the life of Sigmund Freud that brought David Suchet to international attention in the title role. Quite bold for its time, the series addressed some of the major controversies surrounding Freud's reputation from the previous ten years, particularly his abandonment of his so-called "seduction theory" in the 1890s and his friendship with the charismatic but somewhat quackish expert on nasal surgeries Wilhelm Fleiss. (The most sensational of the events in the Fliess/Freud friendship, Fliess' bungled operation of Freud's patient Emma Eckstein where he left gauze packed in her nose after her surgery, is here depicted, although such a minor amount of gauze is removed from her nasal cavity you'd never know in real life it caused the permanent cave-in of part of Eckstein's face.) The series is framed by an elderly, physically impaired Freud, in the last week or so of his life, musing on its major events: episode one is concerned primarily with his early theories on cocaine, episode two with his tutelage under the French hysteria expert Charcot, and so on until the final episode (a real mistake), a kind of memory-fantasia on the major figures we've seen in the previous five episodes and how they all contributed to Freud's disappointments and paranoia.

You've got to give the adapters credit both for tackling such controversial material and for doing so much on a tight budget. The period clothes and sets seem very accurate, although the tiny budget for the entire enterprise makes everything seem quite scamped: the lavish wealth of some of Freud's hysteria patients is never quite realized, so you don't get a full sense of his working milieu, and everything seems a little dark and empty. David Suchet is superb as Freud, mastering the character from his younger ambitious days to his final days hampered by a painful jaw prosthesis, and the storyline provides some of the best actors in the UK of the time with great roles in the hysteria case study patients. (Of these, Juliet Stevenson is the most moving as the self-loathing Elisabeth von R.) And Suzanne Bertish makes for a fascinating Minna Bernays (Freud's flirtatious sister-in-law) during her more attractive years. But the whole thing seems misguided: there's not enough drama and excitement in Freud's life to really keep the thing moving, as in a biographical mini-series about the Tudors or the Julian-Claudian family. There are too many scenes of Freud's colleagues gathered, arguing and arguing, that go on forever, and his home life with his wife Marthe and their many children doesn't make for much excitement either.

Really bloody good! Was absolutely fascinated. Never realized Freud was so interesting, full of joie-de-vivre, had a great relationship with his wife Anna, ahead of his time, experimental, unconventional. Very realistic, historically accurate and meticulous for a 1984 BBC mini-series. The production values were much better than what is usually associated with the BBC at the time, you'd almost think it was just made (except for the much younger looking Suchet). Changed my view of Freud both as a person and as a groundbreaking scientist/philosopher. For me it's David Suchet's on-screen Magnum Opus (Great Work), a very different and brilliant performance by him, arguably his best ever on screen. Severely underrated by some. Anyone interested in psychology, science, history, spirituality, esotericism, Jung, Freud, fun people, or great movies, will like this. I hope this review doesn't disappoint my mother.......(joke).
P.S: Absolutely not Poirot (Although I did like him in that).
I RATE IT: 4.3 STARS

I love David Souchet...but this is undoubtedly the most slow, dragging, boring thing he has ever done. I still haven't finished watching it...it's like waiting for fudge to set.....come on...do something....... bogs down...wish I had my money back .