rooprect This movie is surreal. Literally, it has a lot of surrealistic scenes to mess with your mind, but also the whole presentation is surreal because there are so many bizarre angles. At its heart, it's a sober portrayal of depression and humanity's discontent (so you'd think it would be slow & heavy). But mostly it's humorous, at times as silly as the movie "Airplane!". It also features historical references, but you can't help feeling that the writer is being deliberately playful, distorting facts right before our eyes with a wink and a smile. In all, I think it's an entertaining experience, especially if you don't take it too seriously.It definitely has the qualities of a period piece romp, like maybe "Casanova" (2005), "Molière" (2007) or one of my faves, "Impromptu" (1991) about Chopin. But "When Neitzsche Wept" has a more subtle tone which prevents me from saying it's intended to be a comedy like the others I mentioned. Also, don't expect a biopic because it's not really about any particular man so much as it's about everyman's internal struggle between passion (freedom) and logic (duty).This film takes a somewhat light-hearted approach to a very dark subject, and I think that's what makes it unusual and clever. It's entertaining and digestible, but also there are a few powerful monologues delivered by Neitzsche (Armand Assante) that I had to rewind and hear again because they seemed to appear out of nowhere. Then suddenly we're back to a crazy scene of a redhead woman in diapers jumping around a crib. Don't worry, it all makes sense; it's just... surreal!

Tina Thomas I don't care what other reviewers say, Assante and Cross did a great job in this film! The dream sequences were very important to it and I will watch this more because the 2nd time I watched it, I saw or heard something that I missed. I think if you watch this movie after watching "The Shift" with Dr. Wayne Dyer, those viewers who got frustrated with it will have a better grasp of what is actually taking place in the minds of these characters.This movie is intending to touch on the beginnings of Freudian psychology, but it goes much more than that. It chronicles the lives of two men who are worlds apart emotionally--or are they? It describes a friendship that benefited both for a time--or did it? It's up to the viewer really.Then the viewer is drawn into one of two things--transcendence or a pulling away when this movie hits is or her comfort zone too hard. It is worth a watch, but as I said, if you have trouble with it--watch "The Shift" first. That clears things up as far as character's motivations go.

funkyfry Anybody who has read the fascinating and controversial works by German thinker Friedrich Nietzsche is going to want to at least see how it looks to actually have Nietzsche as a flesh and blood person walking around town going about his business. The fact that Nietzsche is played by Armand Assante shouldn't really be too much of a turn-off, because although it might not be the kind of role we associate with Assante he's always been a decent and dedicated actor.The story is one of those fictional/historical conceits, wherein Friedrich Nietzsche ends up influencing the psychology of Sigmund Freud by way of his association with Lou Salome (potentially true) and Jacob Breuer (not true). In such matters, I'm not such a stickler for "accuracy" but more like accuracy of feeling or idea. Did the film present these characters in such a way as they would have interacted? And so on a scale of 1 to 10 where a 10 represents Salieri and Mozart's relationship and 1 represents Teddy Roosevelt falling in love with Sacajaweah, I guess this movie is maybe a 6 or a 7.But the big surprise of the movie is just how excellent Ben Cross is playing the role of the frustrated doctor Breuer, going through a mid-life crisis and dealing with his own neuroses as a means of bringing Nietzsche out of his shell (basically attempting to get Nietzsche to self-diagnose). His facial expressions, the way he acts out his frustrations with Nietzsche and then tries to hold equal ground as an objective and unemotional intellectual when he's with Freud, is fascinating. During the final sequence of events when he watches the woman he's obsessed with (Michal Yannai) declaring love for another, and is embarrassed to be found beardless waiting tables, his performance reaches rare heights of comic mania.Unfortunately there is bad casting on display as well, in the female leads. Joanna Pacula is the only female member of the cast to hold her weight, and she's not given a lot to do. Yannai is mixed, pulling off most of a very difficult role. But Katheryn Winnick is a terrible actress, saddled here as well with a Russian accent, and she seems imposed on the film for eye candy. The film fails to portray her as someone who Nietzsche or Freud or anybody else would form an intellectual fascination with.The dream sequences, therapy/vision sequences, and hypnotism sequences are all done with fairly poor CGI, but a couple of them are well worth cherishing; particularly humorous and bizarre is the "Swan Lake" sequence.Basically this film would be a decent introduction to basic ideas of Nietzschean philosophy and Freudian psychology, and for more experienced viewers there's at least some intellectual interest in a fantasy fictional representation of the inspiration that Freud took from Nietzsche. Some parts are damaged by the low budget -- it would have been best not to attempt to visually depict any of Nietzsche's "Zarathustra", if the best they were going to do was something that looks like a History Channel re-enactment. But the film is worth watching for Cross' surprising and engaging performance and Assante's not surprising but almost equally engaging performance.

Karl-Capek I found this movie to be delightful, but then, I have been reading Nietzsche for over three decades. The movie pretends that Nietzsche knew Breuer (who did know Freud) and that Breuer knew Salome. If you do not know who these people were, then the movie will be confusing. It also pretends that Salome goes to Breuer for help in curing Nietzsche of a psycho analytical problem. This latter issue speaks to the fact that Nietzsche did go insane, but not because he was crazy, but due to syphilis. In the movie there is a brief nod to the fact that Nietzsche had his final nervous breakdown when he saw a man beating a horse and he rushed to save it.What I found wonderful in the movie was the period eye candy (sets and costumes), although the cinephile will catch lots of "technical flaws" where things appear in scenes that did not exist at the time period portrayed. The other truly superb thing about this movie, and again an area where knowing Nietzsche helps, is the basic plot where Nietzsche teaches Breuer, and likewise Freud, psychoanalysis! The movie accurately portrays the foundational philosophy of Nietzsche and reveals him as the incredible genius that he was. This movie is not for film buffs or historians, but rather fans of Freud and Nietzsche who are able to suspend disbelief and enjoy a "what if".