Proof 2004
Not really a movie about math so much as it is one about success, mental illness, and family. The plot centers around Gwyneth Paltrow’s character whose father (Anthony Hopkins) suffered from debilitating mental illness after making a name as a brilliant mathematician. In her 20’s she put her life on hold to take care of him in the last five years of his life. Now she wonders if she will suffer from the same mental illness, while her sister swoops in and assumes she already is.
The two female leads turn in very good performances with some great interaction between them. Jake Gyllenhaal plays a recent student of the professor’s (seems odd since the guy has been crazy for about 40 years) and provides a romantic spark for Gwyneth. Honestly both of them are entirely too attractive and too human to play math geeks, but it makes for a good cast of characters. The math largely takes a backseat in the form of occasional scribblings that you aren’t supposed to understand anyway. Anthony Hopkins could have been an artist, writer, surgeon, or whatever and the story would have been about the same.
There isn’t a lot of new ground here. We’ve seen movies about mental illness, family drama, tormented geniuses, and reluctant romances (the whole movie is like A Beautiful Mind from a different viewpoint). But I really liked the way it tied a number of themes together and therefore succeeds on many levels. A-.
Written: 13 Jul 2006