In September 1939, three weeks before he died, Sigmund Freud noted in his diary the visit of an Oxford writer to his London home. We don’t know who he was, but the playwright Mark St. Germain imagined that it was CS Lewis (‘Chronicles of Narnia’) and wrote a play about that (im)probable meeting between two opposing worldviews. Freud (Anthony Hopkins) was 83 years old and boasted of atheism, Lewis (Matthew Goode) was 40, and a fervent believer.
Matt Brown (‘The Man Who Knew Infinity’) adapts the text in an exquisitely British production, with superb actors and the production designer of ‘Howards End‘‘What remains of the day’ and ‘Sense and sensitivity’. The date brings together all the ingredients to be a powder keg: the questioning of God, the father figures of both, past traumas, the certainty of death in the psychoanalyst, the conflict with his lesbian daughter and the start of World War II. However, the dialectical duel from which sparks should fly does not end up igniting never and the premise resonates as brighter than the final result.
For lovers of very English atmospheres.
The best: the most theatrical scenes, far above the flashbacks.
Worst: compare it to ‘Twilightlands’, where Hopkins plays CS Lewis.
Data sheet
Address: Matt Brown Distribution: Anthony Hopkins, Matthew Goode, Jodi Balfour, Liv Lisa Fries Country: Ireland, United Kingdom, United States Year: 2023 Release date: 7-6-2024 Gender: Drama Script: Mark St. Germain Duration: 108 min.
Synopsis: On the eve of World War II, the father of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud invites iconic author CS Lewis to a debate about the existence of God.
Laura is a film critic and cultural journalist. The first time she went to the movies she saw ‘ET the Extra-Terrestrial’, and she never forgets that. She has written about theater, music, art, photography, architecture and food in ‘Elle’ and ‘Harper’s Bazaar’. In ‘Fotogramas’ she specializes in what we could call ‘auteur cinema’, although she touches all genres.
He studied Journalism at the Complutense University of Madrid and specialized in the conflict in Northern Ireland at the Queen University of Belfast. Which led him to watch ‘Hidden Agenda’ (Ken Loach, 1990), ‘In the Name of the Father’ (Jim Sheridan, 1997), ‘Bloody Sunday’ (Paul Greengrass, 2002) and all the films that had to do with He will go.
He traveled to Cuba to study at the EICTV (International School of Cinema and Television) in San Antonio de los Baños, where he watched a lot of Latin American cinema and drank too many mojitos. He also filmed a documentary on the island full of wonderful characters. One of his first jobs was on the television channel ‘Cineclassics’, where he co-wrote the documentary ‘Cinema during the Spanish Civil War’.
He loves ‘Empire of the Sun’ (Steven Spielberg, 1987), ‘Bram Stoker’s Dracula’ (Francis Ford Coppola, 1992), ‘Thelma & Louise’ (Ridley Scott, 1992) and ‘The Age of Innocence’ (Martin Scorsese , 1993). But in general, he has a preference for small films that tell stories that no one would notice if they passed them on the street. He likes that cinema that lives beyond the margins of entertainment.
He has co-written the book ‘Cinema and Fashion’ (Ed. Pigmalion Edypro) and throughout his career he has interviewed performers and filmmakers such as Helen Mirren, Al Pacino, Jessica Chastain, Isabelle Huppert, Juliette Binoche, Julianne Moore, Hirokazu Koreeda, Sam Mendes, Jonathan Glazer, Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Jude Law or Hugh Jackman.
