Freud's Last Session

Freud's Last Session
Starring Anthony Hopkins, Matthew Goode, Liv Lisa Fries, Jodi Balfour
Directed by Matthew Brown

I'm a big fan of films that feel like plays, centering on one location and focusing on a few characters as they battle wits and emotions. Some examples include "Fences" and "The Two Popes," where both feature strong, stellar performances that are grounded in a gritty reality that is so captivating you can't take your eyes off the screen, as verbal jabs feel like epic battles and auditory agreements feel like you're witnessing some of the most awe-inspiring truces. So a film like "Freud's Last Session" should be a slam dunk: take history's most prolific psychoanalyst and the world's most renown theologian and put them in a room together to discuss everything from war to religion to psychology, and witness greatness on screen. Sadly the film meanders on the fringes and never hits the meat and potatoes of the matter, resulting in a sluggish and downright boring outing where I couldn't muster the desire to keep my eyes open let alone on the screen.

In the waning years of his life due to inoperable oral cancer, Sigmund Freud (Anthony Hopkins) welcomes young religious author C.S. Lewis (Matthew Goode) to his home for some deep discussions about faith, life, death, and psychology. As the two spar wits, Freud's daughter Anna (Liv Lisa Fries) deals with her over-dependence on her father and harboring her secret love Dorothy Burlingham (Jodi Balfour), fearing her father wouldn't accept it. As the two men talk, Freud's demeanor breaks as he shares his fears of death, while Lewis becomes vulnerable about his newfound faith and how it contradicts his fears of war after the horrors he endured during World War I.


The Good:
You get Anthony Hopkins in anything, and it's going to be amazing just from the pedigree. He excelled in another talking film, "The Two Popes," which incidentally was also a fictionalized dialogue between two greats in history: Pope Benedict and Pope Francis. That film earned Hopkins an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor, but there'll be no accolades here. While he delivers another strong, committed performance, it's overshadowed by the lack of depth which is surprising considering the two men at the center. He plays Freud as a broken man, an athiest who doesn't fully understand Goode's religious zealousness and who worries about his upcoming death, wondering what will happen in the afterlife. He also deals with his daughter who has an unhealthy obsession with him, as he discusses the themes of sexual identity and morality.

Matthew Goode more than holds his own against the likes of Hopkins, playing C.S. Lewis as a quiet yet resolved man, someone who's unashamed to talk about his faith and belief yet also conceals his fears of the past, especially his time in World War I. He makes Lewis vulnerable, and it's a very believable and capable performance.


The Bad:
Despite seeing these two titans go head-to-head in a verbal sparring match, their dialogues meander and wane, never fully coming to a solid conclusion on anything. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it doesn't allow for deep conversations outside the generalized norms. I went in expecting to have my own faith challenged, my own thoughts questioned, but instead I found my eyes drooping due to the boredom and monotony. Maybe I went into it with too high expectations, but I was left wanting on many levels.


The Summary:
While seemingly promising a dialogue for the ages between two titans of history, "Freud's Last Session" was instead a humdrum affair that never tackled the deeper issues of faith and psychiatry you'd expect from a fictionalized meeting between Sigmund Freud and C.S. Lewis.


The Score: C-