A Dangerous Method (David Cronenberg, 2011)

In one interview I read around the time of release of The White Ribbon Michael Haneke said, "Classicism becomes avant-garde when everyone else is doing their utmost to develop new stylistic forms." After watching A Dangerous Method this quote came to mind. The film's highly classic style gave it this incredibly strange aura. More than the plot and Keira Knightley's hysteria (although her wonderful bodily contortions were one of the best performances of 2011), the form was what made this film uncanny. The plot and structure of the film, the way it sometimes it becomes a series of letters back and forth or the way it is part chronicle of Freud and Jung's crucial meetings with themselves and Sabina/part scandal story with the mistress plot/part chronicle of an artists or scientist struggles, doubts, processes, etc, all make it an incredibly bizarre plot to begin with. The classical compositions that recall Wyler or Welles with big heads looming in the foreground and other subjects in the background and overall visual style (think of the scene in the boat, does that look like any other film of 2011?) is what sets it over the top, in a good way. Another way that the film feels classical is with its craftsmanship, not only in the mise-en-scene and framing, but everything from editing to sound; reminiscent of the studio days when craftsmen could build incredibly well made films. Its endless conversations and insights into the nature of desire and its relationship with the individual and society, as well as those bodily contortions mentioned earlier, made it clearly a Cronenberg film. Also - Vincent Cassel delivers a perfect performance as Otto Gross, even though he is barely in the film, his name is well deserved in the trailer/poster.

Excerpt from "Filming Dangerously: An Interview with David Cronenberg", from Cineaste Vol. XXXVII No. 1:

(Answering a question about the film's visual style)

"In a way, it's very classical. As I say ad nauseam, I let the movie tell me what it needs and what it wants. And, in this case, thinking of the society of the time-everything was rigoursouly controlled and everyone in the empire knew his place; you had those stiff collars-I thought that a very classical style would deliver the tone of the period."