Watch When Nietzsche Wept For Free

Thanks for the memories!

How sad is this?

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

This is just plainly disgusting. No regard for actual facts about the protagonist and no mind paid to his ideas whatsoever. Some reviewers have opined, that the novel on which this movie is based was okay or even good. I haven't read it, so I take their word for it. I dearly hope that it isn't anything like this abominable piece of crap though. Acting and setting leave a lot to be wished for, establishing context seems to be a very alien concept to the makers of this film. I usually do not comment on movies, but this one really ticked me off. Why this was even made is quite beyond me. Stay clear, neither informative nor entertaining so save your time and energy for better causes. ;)

Josef Breuer and Sigmund Freud did work together and they did collaborate on a book about Anna O, who was most likely Bertha. Lou Salome did have relationships with Nietzsche and Freud and many others. All of these things are true.But, Breuer did not treat Nietzsche. That is in the author's (Irvin D. Yalom) imagination, and what a great imagination it was. The story makes a super philosopher seem human, with frailties that we all suffer. It also makes for an interesting story of how psychoanalysis came about. I can imagine that it really did develop this way as Breuer and Feud discovered what worked and what didn't. We see free association or "chimney sweeping" as Bertha called it, we certainly see transference, and much more as the discipline developed.Ben Cross was excellent, Armand Assante gave the best performance I have ever seen from him, Jamie Elman let us see Feud as a young man, Katheryn Winnick certainly makes me want to see her again, and Michal Yannai was delightful.A great period piece that will delight all who care about philosophy and psychology.

Fine production values, a dry sense of humor throughout, literate script, decent casting (Assante transcends his usual "heroics" and plays a crumbling soul nicely and Cross is always workmanlike and solid), and, slyly, the film (as the book did) finally gives Nietzsche credit for inventing modern psychoanalysis (since Freud, et al, in the field stole from his works outrageously and lavishly, without assigning him the proper credit for his startlingly original insights into the world-historical human, all too human capacity for self-deception).A tough work for an adaptation, but this movie succeeds where something like "Freud" dismally collapsed into timid clichés.Nietzsche would have gotten many a devilish laugh out of this work's visual craftiness.And appreciated being treated, not as a cartoon "Overman" idol, but a struggling, flawed, tragic-comically-profound human."Ecce Homo", his anti-"autobiography" warned those who followed not to take him too seriously.If this film stimulates a few people to pick up his "Joyful Wisdom" (La Gaya Scienza) or "Dawn", it will have made its honorable point.Yalom was, in essence, giving Nietszche a posthumous brother's embrace for his loneliness and struggle and brilliance and scorn and lack of recognition while he lived.This movie does the same.To a guy, who, friendless and abandoned and ignored through much of his writing life, still affirmed the Universe and humanity in the words: "Man would rather have the Void for a purpose than be void of purpose." -F.N.Worth a viewing.

My comments on this movie have been deleted twice, which i find pretty offending, since i am making an effort to judge this movie for other people. Please be tolerant of other people's opinion. Obviously writing in the spirit of Nietzsches works is not understood, so ill change my comment completely.I think this is a really bad movie for several reasons.Subject: one should be very careful in making a movie about a philosopher that is even today not understood by the masses and amongst peers brings out passionate discussions. One thing philosophers do agree on is that Nietzsche was a great thinker. So making a movie about his life, which obviously includes his 'ideas' is a thing one should be extremely careful with, or preferably, don't do at all. Wisdom starts with knowing what you don't know. One might think this is not a review of the movie itself, but the movie is not about an imaginary character, it is about the life of someone who actually lived and had/has great influence on the world of yesterday, today and tomorrow. If someone tells a story about a tomato, i can express my thoughts about the story itself, but also about the chosen subject, the tomato. There is a responsibility for producers when they make a movie about actual facts. Specially in a case like this and this responsibility was not taken.Screenplay: One of the first things i noticed were the ridiculous accents. Why? It distracts from what it should be about; Nietzsche and the truths he found. It doesn't help putting things in a right geographical perspective or time! Come on, make it proper English or better yet; German! Even Mel Gibson got that part right... letting his characters speak some gibberish Aramaic in the Passion.Secondly, it is well over-acted.3d, Assante is not an actor to depict Nietzsche. Bad casting.4th, facts are way off.And so on. Its a waste of celluloid.