MOVIE OF THE DAY: "FREUD" (1962)

Few high-pedigree movies of the last half-century or so have done such a thorough disappearing act as Freud. Premiering to major fanfare in 1962, it quickly underwent nervous studio butchering before vanishing into the collective unconsciousness of Hollywood producers, who would make sure not to make any more movies about psychiatrists, unless they were farces or Barbra Streisand vanity projects. 

Perhaps the headcases who ran Universal-International Pictures realized too late that a movie called Freud, directed by John Huston and starring Montgomery Clift, wasn't going to be a date movie. Instead, it focuses on the Viennese shrink developing his theory on how we're all screwed up because we either loved our mothers too much and hated our fathers, or vice-versa, or both. In a year that saw two Disney productions in the top 10 highest-grossing movies, Freud was not what the doctor ordered.

Forget that much of Freud's work in this field has been discredited in the last couple of decades. (For some reason, women go into hysterics over the word "hysteria.") There's much to admire about Freud on its own terms. First, Huston made the wise decision to abandon the original script written by France's favorite cockeyed philosopher, Jean-Paul Satre, which would have run about 10 hours. 

No wonder he never got the girl on
"The Man from U.N.C.L.E."

Second, casting Montgomery Clift was brilliant, in that his presence -- usually described by movie historians as "troubled" -- makes Freud more human than we tend to picture him. I mean, this Freud is so repulsed by his patients that he temporarily quits psychiatry altogether, because these people are, you know, nuts. I mean, how would you react to David McCallum speaking like Peter Lorre before making out with a headless mannequin he thinks his is mother?

"On the count of three, you're going to quack
like a duck. Just kidding!"

But thanks to his mentor, Dr. Josef Breuer, Freud is soon back in the game, taking on the case of Cecily Koertner, blind and paralyzed since a traumatic childhood incident involving her father. Peeling back the layers of Cecily's memories like a jumbo shallot, Freud cures her physically and psychologically, while discovering the root of his own deep-seated hatred for his father. Doesn't anybody like their parents?


If all this sounds like the patient-curing-the-doctor routine beloved by Reader's Digest, don't be put off. Freud is a serious, perhaps great movie, even if it has a whiff of old Hollywood about it. The mishmash of accents; occasional dialogue along the lines of, Siggy, you look hungry, eat a sandwich!; the boastful father who envisions great things for his son the doctor. 

Yet, had Huston waited for a more liberated time, Freud would have lost its prime assets: Montgomery Clift; the stunning black and white photography; and Jerry Goldsmith's Twilight Zone-ish score (parts of which were later lifted for Alien). The dream sequences, by the way, look like the dreams I have, which, upon reflection, is more information than you need.

"Say,  you look familiar..."

One of Huston's inspired casting choices directly involves Freud's sexual theories. Freud's wife Martha believes that he married her only because, according to him, we all fall in love with someone who reminds us of somebody else. No surprise, then, that the actresses playing Freud's mother and wife look like sisters. If that's not enough, Rosalie Crutchie, as Freud's mother, was only 42 -- the same age as Montgomery Clift. Oh, yuck.

Larry Parks expounds on the psychological 
underpinnings of singing "My Mammy."

In hiring Larry Parks as Dr. Breuer, Huston was doing his bit to break the Hollywood blacklist. Famous for starring in The Jolson Story and Jolson Sings Again, Parks' movie career was derailed by admitting to Congress that, when barely out of his teens, he was very briefly affiliated with the Communist party. A white guy in blackface who was once red -- only in Hollywood, kids. 

Freud himself should have been on the set of the movie. John Huston emotionally tortured

Having fun with Spence and Monty.

Montgomery Clift over the latter's sexuality. Clift, now in the depths of his booze and drug addiction, briefly fled to Germany for the premiere of Judgement at Nuremberg, where, reports film historian John McElwee, "a hostile German press merely exacerbated [his] already bizarre behavior... [Clift], according to one observer, 'showed up stoned and drunk out of his mind, jumping on Spence’s back.' Things got worse when Monty crawled on his hands and knees between the aisles, and 'screamed all sorts of crazy things,' causing Tracy to flee from the auditorium." Today, that kind of thing would earn you a spokesman gig for Cabo Wabo Tequila and a guest shot on Two and a Half Men. 

"Good God, I can't believe
that title!"

Still far more interesting than most any movie today, Freud comes from a time when intelligent dialogue was not only important, but expected from this kind of drama. Unfortunately, the studio wasn't particularly keen on it. Shorn of several minutes for general release, the film was quickly re-released with the legendarily stupid title Freud: The Secret Passion. Some posters printed it as Freud: A Secret Passion -- a subtle yet vital difference for the article-obsessed.

Following its TV debut in the late '60s, Freud vanished for about 15 years before briefly reappearing on home video. It went AWOL for many more years until a handful of airings on cable television -- then disappeared again for over a decade. Today, the original 140-minute version is commercially available on DVD only in Spain.

Well, not quite. I remember a particular dream sequence at a train depot during AMC's sole broadcast of Freud about 25 years ago. When watching the DVD, I was disappointed to discover that it was missing. For God's sakes, leave Freud alone!

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