Poster number two for David Cronenberg’s A Dangerous Method is MUCH better than the first version. This one is still geared toward the European film market since it’s in French, and it still carries the Venice Film Festival logo in the upper left hand corner (which makes me wonder why it’s not in Italian. Is French the universal language of pretentious artistes and film festivals?) The difference (other than the better Photoshop), however, is that while Keira Knightley is still in the center of the two men, a metaphor to be sure, they at least don’t appear to be peering over her shoulders like the poster for a bad rom-com.

There is nothing “com” about this film and I suspect there’s very little “rom” either. The relationships in A Dangerous Method are more of the adult variety, omitting the pandering to teen-aged boys altogether. The film tells the tale of Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud and their troubled patient, Sabine Spielrein.

Viggo Mortensen, who worked for Cronenberg in A History of Violence and again in Eastern Promises, plays Freud. He is joined by Michael Fassbender as Jung and, of course, Keira Knightley as Sabine.  Vincent Cassell is also along for the ride and since it hasn’t been made clear in the trailers, I can’t wait to find out just what his character’s story is. He’s always interesting to watch. Christopher Hampton wrote the script, adapting his own 2002 play, “The Talking Cure”.

A Dangerous Method will play the Venice Film Festival, the Toronto International Film Festival and the New York Film Festival before opening in the US on November 23 and 10 February in the UK.