Released: 23rd March 2020
Number of episodes: 8
Where to Watch: Netflix
Created by: Marvin Kren, Stefan Brunner and Benjamin Hessler
Starring: Robert Finster, Ella Rumpf, Georg Friedrich and Stefan Konarske
Reaching beyond overt action and larger-than-life characters, the psychological drama is often underappreciated on the small screen. Freud is one series that fails to make good on its this perspective, while also mishandling its push towards supernatural elements.
Following a young Sigmund Freud, the series sees the doctor at the early stages of his work. When he stumbles across the baffling behaviour of Fleur It soon becomes clear that Fleur is part of a grander conspiracy, a revenge plot against the Austrian-Hungary empire many years in the making. Sigmund Freud is an individual laced with intrigue and intent, his founding of psychoanalysis continuing to resonate decades later. The German series had an opportunity to convey this process, only to instead devolve into overblown supernatural fluff. At first the series starts off with some interesting questions, most notably how the doctor will manage to sway his doubting colleagues; there’s a hint of investment here as Freud looks to break into unknown territory. But as the plot veers off into another direction, this motivation is put to the side as we criss-cross between many different characters. The three main leads; Freud, Fleur and Kiss, have their stories told in a very trudging manner with very little flow between them, almost as if the series can’t decide who to focus on the most. Even the climax feels especially rushed with very little build-up to the scheme the antagonists have. It’s certainly a very grisly tale at times, charged with bloodshed and sex, but without proper context or development, it borders on being grating. For example there’s a pagan-esque ritual with buckets of blood smeared everywhere in the latter half of the series, but we learn very little about what drives the characters to put on this gruesome visage. While the final episode does bring plot threads together to an extent, things still feel fairly disjointed for a good portion of the season.
Without the flow and interplay between the character’s individual struggles, there’s a greater pressure on the main cast to fill in the gaps Robert Finster’s portrayal of the doctor is merely fine, fitting the bill of a protagonist without really going beyond that. His thought process is rather basic throughout; swinging a watch to hypnotise a patient or two and leaving it at that. We never delve into the mental gymnastics behind his deductions, causing the protagonist to blend into the background at many moments. Suffering from a split personality, Fleur’s halves are channelled well enough by Ella Rumpf, but there are times where her performance goes a bit overboard in the theatrical side, lessening the more serious tone Freud takes on. Finally, Inspector Alfred Kiss’s (Georg Friedrich) battle with post-traumatic-stress-disorder and the pressures of his job is based on a stop-start style of pacing, his flashbacks being mostly disconnected from the other players. Most of the actors aren’t at fault; instead it’s a weak script that saps much of the development they could have had. The other side characters are too basic and underhanded to make an impression, only contributing to the narrative at specific points.
Incredibly detailed moustaches aside, Freud offers another committed historical rendition. With the action being filmed in the Czech Republic, there’s a great effort to realise the old world of Vienna in the late 1800s. Classical architecture, period-perfect costume work and the horse carriages roaming up and down the streets; it’s all very close to the real thing. I was particularly impressed by the detail of the Austrian officials, their bright uniforms and medals consistently marking their place in society. On top of this, the mental fractures within the characters do boast some good camerawork flourishes, often contorting and scrambling the view to represent their fragile state of mind. The grievous wounds sustained throughout the eight episodes get incredibly brutal, but while there’s certainly a tense danger conveyed; the film doesn’t follow up by getting audiences fully invested.
For all its efforts to graft a supernatural tone onto its titular psychologist, Freud is a considerable let-down in both investment and genre storytelling. It’s tough to get fully invested in the characters, the plotting is very thin and what could have been a thought-provoking tale ends up feeling aggressively average. At best, it’s another detailed window into history, but for the most part you’ll won’t be very enthralled.
Rating: 2/5 Stars (Disappointing)
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