Vienna, 1913, Europe is on the brink of WWI. Two young men become friends: Hugo, a musician from a privileged family, tries psychoanalysis with Sigmund Freud, while Adolf, a struggling artist obsessed with vegetarianism, falls in love with German nationalism. This is Richard Ledes’ second fiction film based on the work of a Lacanian psychoanalyst and includes a portrayal of an analysis; this time conducted by Sigmund Freud as played by Alan Cumming.

The screenplay based on a play by the renowned French psychoanalyst and writer Alain Didier-Weill. 

Director's Statement:

I wrote the screenplay for V13 based on a play by the renowned French psychoanalyst and writer Alain Didier-Weill. Researching and reflecting on the rise of extreme German nationalism in Vienna before WWI and how it gave rise to the ideology of Nazism after were lifelong pursuits of Didier-Weill. He was himself analyzed by Jacques Lacan, the controversial French psychoanalyst who was one of the most important intellectual figures of the 20th century.

The roots of his interest, no doubt, go back to the experiences of his own Jewish family during the occupation of France but also to his conviction that it was important for all of humanity to examine the roots of the Nazi ideology—just as Freud had felt psychoanalysis was important for all of humanity.

Filmed overtly in New York City, V13 raises unsettling questions about the relation between this moment in the past and the rise of ethnonationalism in the present.

— Richard C. Ledes 

“V13 is dense, intense and impactful. It is full of important questions regarding the history of psychoanalysis, political history of the 20th century and the political moment through which the world is now passing.”

— Betty Fuks, author of the book, Freud and the Invention of Jewishness 

“A complex portrait of the impossible profession at a vertiginous moment in history, Richard Ledes’s film, V13, asks whether the talking cure can also cure society’s ills... Sigmund Freud (Alan Cumming) is confronted with a troubling new patient—a young man (Liam Aiken) tormented by his own hatred of Jews. Set against a background of rising fascism, we are given a startlingly modern vision of Freud, sensitive and wise beyond any patient’s wildest dreams. This ambitious and thoughtful film resonates with the concerns of today.”

— Leslie Camhi, cultural critic and historian of psychoanalysis