THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING
Directed by James March
2014
Ms. Hen watched THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING, simply because she
likes to know what’s fashionable. She liked the film, but it was nothing
extraordinary. It helped that she does not know that much about Stephen
Hawking, so much of the film was new information to her.
It is the story of Stephen and his wife Jane Hawking, based
on her memoir, TRAVELING TO INFINITY. Stephen was a brilliant young physicist
in the 1960s at Cambridge University and Jane was studying French and Spanish.
He wooed her with conversation about the stars and she told him she wanted to
study medieval Iberian poetry because she liked the idea of time travel.
He was diagnosed with motor neuron disease, and the doctors
gave him two years to live. He lived much longer than that, and is still alive
today. He wrote his thesis and the advisors told him his theory about black
holes was brilliant.
His illness got worse and worse, and he refused to get help
in the house. Jane and Stephen had three children. Eventually, he lost his
voice and had to speak through a computer. Jane struggled taking care of him and the children and in
the end, they got a divorce.
There is nothing wrong with the film THE THEORY OF
EVERYTHING. But there is nothing wonderful about it either. It is about people
who are nice, who can’t help but be nice and the niceness makes them boring,
even though they may be brilliant. Even when they have affairs and do bad
things to each other, they’re being nice.
Ms. Hen doesn’t know how she feels about such niceness. She
likes attitude and spunk and people who have those aren’t entirely nice. Even
though Stephen Hawking is a nice person and is considered brilliant, Ms. Hen
doesn’t think she would like to have coffee with him because he seems too nice.
On the other hand, it could be the film that portrayed him
that way. Films have a way of making people squeaky clean and much nicer than
they are in actuality. Some films go the opposite way and show people in a
worse light.
The one shining aspect of this film is Eddie Redmayne’s performance.
Ms. Hen believes that he became Stephen Hawking, that he channeled his inner
Stephen Hawking and magic happened.
Ms. Hen was reminded of the film THE IMITATION GAME, with
which she was also not impressed. It’s the “Great Man” genre, showing men
overcoming obstacles to achieve great things. It’s a formula, but THE THEORY OF
EVERYTHING was better than THE IMITATION GAME because it was a more amazing
story and the audience rooted for the characters. Because they were so nice.
Back to the nice thing. This film was not exactly Ms. Hen’s cup of tea, but if you’re
into physics, marriage or watching people being nice, it may be the thing for
you.
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