Review of A Dangerous Method (2011) by Karoline A — 11 Apr 2012

I was intrigued for the first 20 minutes, but after a while the movie got a little too heavy on the dialogue and left me feeling rather unsatisfied when it was over.

The performances were all fantastic, especially Keira Knightley who was exceptionally good at playing a crazed mental patient with daddy issues. It might just be her most impressive role to date even if her Russian accent could use some work. Viggo Mortensen was reliably great as Froid, completely devouring the role as usual, and Michael Fassbender is just as good as you'd expect him to be.

David Cronenberg's signature direction is present here but it could only carry the movie for so long. There's so much dialogue and so much dated vocabulary that I had no idea what the characters were talking about and lost interest after a while. At first the dialogue brought a smirk to my face because of how old fashioned it sounded, but it just got all the more tiresome as the movie progressed.

Well acted and directed, but definitely not one of Cronenberg's best. I would suggest watching any of his other films personally, like Eastern Promises. Yeah, watch that one instead.