The King's Speech and the effects of Psychoanalytic Therapy

Cinema and psychoanalysis have an endless relationship of encounters and disagreements. On the one hand, both seek to find the truth, although always halfway, and on the other hand, while the cinema dictates stories and creates vicissitudes of desire, psychoanalysis rather points out the impossibility of a conclusive story, the search for the lost object and unavailable.

However, the value of cinema within psychoanalysis is indisputable, since in the manifest themes of the movies it is possible to discover a latent content, creating a parallel path for the recognition of the unconscious.

In this case, we will analyze the film The king's speech from a psychoanalytic perspective. This work brings us closer to the historical figure King George VI of the United Kingdom. At first it seems that the film is directed towards a monarchical, historical and family context; however, the latent motive is to show the steps of a therapeutic process, the relief or reduction of the symptom and the path to a cure. Through this analysis we will see some fundamental elements for the effectiveness of psychoanalytic therapy.

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The king's speech and its implications in psychoanalysis

The film tells the story of the Duke of York (Bertie) who is forced to be king after his father's death and his brother's abdication of the throne. The dilemma is that since his childhood Bertie suffers from a heavy stuttering that does not allow him to speak fluently and thus undermines his role as king in a difficult period of the history. This leads him to desperately seek a solution to his problem and after much searching he reaches the speech therapist / analyst Lionel, who will show him a deeper approach to his symptom.

framing

At first, we see that the initial contact is made by the wife after a long unsuccessful search to solve the problem of her husband. Desperation leads them to the door of Lionel, a therapist with a rather peculiar style.. However, to get treatment started, it is essential that Bertie's motivation goes beyond simply pleasing his wife.

In the initial session, Bertie is very resistant and wants to be the person who directs the process by telling Lionel how they are going to work; However, Lionel quickly manages to establish the frame, starting from the phrase: "my castle, my rules", establishing from the beginning that he will be the one who will set the parameters. The setting is established when Lionel tells the king that they will meet in his office and not elsewhere, that during the date he cannot smoke and that the only way he is going to call him is Bertie and not as someone from the royalty. In addition, Lionel establishes the number of sessions per week and the fees.

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therapeutic alliance

It is precisely the framing, and these constant variables, which will allow the therapeutic alliance between patient and analyst. The therapeutic alliance implies some kind of relationship, in which the healthy aspects of I of the patient form a partnership with the therapist who, like two opponents, fight against the elements neurotics of the patient.

However, there are some elements of the I of the patient who oppose the therapeutic process. On the one hand, the patient wishes to alleviate his neurotic suffering and his incapacity, but, on the other hand, he does not he wants to give up his neurosis as it represents his best adaptive attempt to resolve a conflict psychic.

Endurance

The desire to maintain neurosis is called resistance and can be both conscious and unconscious.. In Bertie's case we see that after the initial contact, he storms out of the session saying that Lionel's work is a big scam. In this case, the therapeutic alliance is not only affected by the language disorder, but mainly by the lack of trust. that Bertie feels in the unconventional techniques that his therapist uses and consequently, the processes are interrupted transfer them.

However, Lionel cunningly manages to lower the unconscious resistance through music, putting Bertie's thoughts on pause and getting him to record a speech. When Bertie listens to the recording, he returns to Lionel voluntarily and willing to start a process with him, it can be say then that the treatment truly begins from this point when there is a real desire on the part of the patient.

The therapist in the place of the supposed knowledge

Right now, Bertie places Lionel, as he would say Lacan, in the place of Assumed Know, which is the element that allows a treatment to begin. This Assumed Know it is what comes to complement that emptiness than the general symptom, what does this mean that it happens to me? And it puts the subject to work to find that answer. The patient comes to the consultation for a manifest reason, but within the psychoanalytic model it is believed that this reason has a response to the symptom and is This is precisely what allows the transference to be established and the analyst to reach the most intimate place of the subject, that is, the place of the lack. However, we observe in the film that Lionel doesn't rush the process; on the contrary, it respects the autonomy of Bertie and the time of treatment.

Autonomy

The autonomy It is a principle that refers to the fact that psychologists should not make or interfere in the decisions of their patients because they consider them free agents. Bertie returns to therapy, but tells Lionel that he only wants to work on speech mechanics and not personal nonsense. Logue does not agree with this because he considers that he will only alleviate the problem in a superficial way, however, he respects his decision and begins a therapy based only on physical exercises. It's later in the movie when we see that Bertie begins to trust Lionel more and thanks to this he is able to share something about his personal history with him..

The speech and the symptom

He non-speech it is considered a clinical obstacle, since it causes the closure of the unconscious and intervenes with transference processes. As Lacan would say, "the unconscious is structured like a language", and that is why psychoanalysis moves in the field of linguistics, in the relationship between signified and signifier and in the chain that is established from the same. The symptom comes to hide an unknown truth and through the discourse the subject says more than that he knows and unconsciously organizes what was not initially symbolized moment. In addition, we look at the mind-body relationship, this arrangement also has a direct effect on stuttering.

At the end of the film, Bertie manages to give the final speech with a noticeable improvement. As we can see, the symptom does not completely disappear, but rather takes on a more adaptive form.