The Man Who Knew Infinity (2015)'s comments

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Siskoid

The Man Who Knew Infinity could not be a more formulaic biopic. Hot young star in the unlikely genius role? Check (Dev Patel). Great act-ore in the White Messiah/mentor role who actually learns something from his protégé by the end? Check (Jeremy Irons). And while I know very well that this happened - a genius mathematician from India (Ramanujan) gave up everything in the 1910s to go to Cambridge and publish, and if it's true it can't be a function of "formula" - the script and direction add very little to the biopic genre. Excuse the pun here, but it couldn't be more by the numbers. In Ramanujan's intuitive process and frustration with Academia's need for "proofs", there was ample opportunity to play with theme, which just doesn't happen. Watchable, in that the performances are sensitive, the math problems aren't dwelled on, and Patel is sympathetic as a man ripped from his own culture and beaten down by jealous, bigoted Anglos, but if you've watched any university-based films at all, you won't see anything you haven't before, and I could name three math movies I'd rather watch right now.

8 years ago