A Dangerous Method


 * [first lines]
 * Carl Jung: Good morning. Dr. Jung. I admitted you yesterday.
 * Sabina Spielrein: I’m not…I’m not mad, you know?
 * Carl Jung: Let me explain what I have in mind. I propose that we meet here, most days, to talk for an hour or two.
 * Sabina Spielrein: Talk?
 * Carl Jung: Yes. Just talk. See if we can identify what’s troubling you. So as to distract you as little as possible I’m going to sit there, behind you. I’m gonna ask you to try not to turn around and look at me under any circumstance.
 * [Jung sits behind Sabina and starts questioning her]
 * Carl Jung: Have you any idea what brought on these attacks you suffer from?
 * [Sabina starts having spasms]
 * Sabina Spielrein: Humi…humiliation…any…any kind of humiliation. I can’t bare to see it! It…it makes me feel nauseated. I start pouring with sweat, cold sweat.
 * [Sabina has another spasm]
 * Sabina Spielrein: My father lost his temper all the time. He was always…he was always angry.
 * [she suddenly stops talking]
 * Carl Jung: When you stopped talking just now, did a thought come into your head?
 * Sabina Spielrein: I don’t know!
 * Carl Jung: Or an image, perhaps? Was it an image?
 * Sabina Spielrein: Yes! Yes!
 * Carl Jung: What was the image?
 * Sabina Spielrein: It was…a hand! My…my father’s hand.
 * Carl Jung: Why do you think you saw that?
 * Sabina Spielrein: Whenever he…after, whenever he…hit us, afterwards we had to…we had to kiss his hand.
 * [having breakfast with his wife, who is pregnant]
 * Carl Jung: That case I was writing up last week, I happen to pick the code names Sabina S. And here she is! Sabina Spielrein.
 * Emma Jung: Quite a coincidence.
 * Carl Jung: As you know, I don’t believe there is such a thing.
 * Emma Jung: Spielrein is not a very Russian name.
 * Carl Jung: No. Jewish. Father’s very successful import export man. She’s exceptionally well educated. Speaks fluent German. Aspires to be a doctor herself apparently.
 * Emma Jung: Perhaps she’s the one.
 * Carl Jung: What one?
 * Emma Jung: The one you’ve been looking for. For your experimental treatment, the Talking Cure.
 * Carl Jung: You’re so astute. I’ve already begun it with her. What I don’t understand is why Freud, having proposed this radical therapeutic idea of talking cure and psychoanalysis, then lets years go by without giving the barest outline of his clinical procedures. What’s he playing at?
 * Emma Jung: Presumably he used his method on his patients?
 * Carl Jung: No idea.
 * Emma Jung: So much for being the first doctor to try this out.
 * Carl Jung: It’s possible.
 * Emma Jung: Why don’t you write and ask him?
 * Carl Jung: I don’t know him. As it happens, Spielrein’s mother wanted to take her to see Freud.
 * Emma Jung: Another coincidence?
 * Sabina Spielrein: My father thinks my mother doesn’t love him. And he’s right, she doesn’t.
 * Carl Jung: How do you know?
 * Sabina Spielrein: My angel told me.
 * Carl Jung: What angel?
 * Sabina Spielrein: An…an inner voice. He used to tell me I was an exceptional person. For some reason he always spoke in German.
 * Carl Jung: Angels always speak German. It’s traditional.
 * Sabina Spielrein: He gave me the power to know what people are going to say before they open their mouths.
 * Carl Jung: Useful ability for a doctor. You hope to be a doctor some day, don’t you?
 * Sabina Spielrein: I’ll never be a doctor.
 * Carl Jung: Why not? I have to go away for a while. I’m sorry, we’ve just gotten started. Military service, we all have to do it. Just for a couple of weeks.
 * Sabina Spielrein: It’s a waste of time!
 * [she walks angrily past him and drops her coat to the ground]
 * Sabina Spielrein: I can’t tell you whatever it is you want to know. You’re just…you’re just making me angry! And even if I could tell you, you’d be sorry you ever….! Anyway, there’s nothing even wrong with me. I don’t even want to get better!
 * [Jung picks up her coat and starts beating it with his cane to get rid of the dirt]
 * Sabina Spielrein: Stop it!
 * Carl Jung: Well, I was only trying to…
 * Sabina Spielrein: Just stop that!
 * Carl Jung: I’m sorry.
 * Sabina Spielrein: Can we get back now?
 * Carl Jung: Yes, if you want to.
 * Sabina Spielrein: I need to get back.
 * [referring to his military service]
 * Carl Jung: It’s a complete waste of my time. Writing prescriptions for Athlete’s Foot and examining cocks from morning till night.
 * Emma Jung: I’m sad for you too.
 * Carl Jung: It’s not good for me. It’s not good for my patients.
 * [entering Sabina’s room]
 * Carl Jung: I’m back. How have you been?
 * [Sabina is lying in her bed with her back to him doesn’t reply]
 * Carl Jung: I’ve been talking to the Herr Direktor, about finding some work for you. I told him you’d always been interested in medicine, so he suggested that you might like to assist me occasionally, in my research. We’re quite short staffed, so you’d certainly be of help to me.
 * [we see Jung doing some psychological test on his wife, timing the answers with Sabina helping him in doing the experiment]
 * Carl Jung: Vienna?
 * Emma Jung: Woods.
 * Carl Jung: Box?
 * Emma Jung: Bed.
 * Carl Jung: Money?
 * Emma Jung: Bank.
 * Carl Jung: Child?
 * Emma Jung: Soon.
 * Carl Jung: Family?
 * Emma Jung: Unit.
 * Carl Jung: Sex?
 * Emma Jung: Um…male.
 * Carl Jung: Wall?
 * Emma Jung: Flower.
 * Carl Jung: Young?
 * Emma Jung: Baby.
 * Carl Jung: Ask?
 * Emma Jung: Answer.
 * Carl Jung: Cap.
 * Emma Jung: Wear.
 * Carl Jung: Stubborn.
 * Emma Jung: Give way.