There are few living scientists today who are known outside their field of work, well recognized throughout the world and are an inspiration to students to take to science. That credit goes to Dr.Stephen Hawking, who has done phenomenal contribution to general theory of relativity, his work on Hawking radiation, our understanding on quantum mechanics and cosmology. The little bit of interest I developed in Physics, Cosmology was after I read Dr.Hawkings book “The Brief History of Time” in late 80s, around the time I was in Junior college.
Dr.Hawking’s have achieved all this in defiance to his crippling illness due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, made popular by Ice Bucket Challenge) or motor neurone disease. One of my good friends’ kids are affected by a form of ALS and I have seen how painful it can be for the patients and their caregivers. Seeing them, I can say it’s remarkable what Dr.Hawkings has achieved. The credit for his long and productive life goes to his first wife “Jane Wilde”, without whom the world would have lost one of the greatest physicist without hearing about his works.
The film “The Theory of Everything” is based on memoir “Travelling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen” by Jane Wilde. I saw this film directed brilliantly by James Marsh today. Both the lead actors Eddie Redmayne as Stephen Hawking and Felicity Jones as Jane Wilde Hawking, have brought in front of us the life of real Mrs. & Mr.Hawkings. The story has provided the Director (James Marsh) with ample opportunity to dramatize the incidents, but he has refrained from doing that, and it’s clearly visible in the product on screen. Whether it’s the budding romance between Jane and Jonathan (played by Charlie Cox), or the scene where, soon after discovery of his illness Stephen avoids seeing Jane, or in the final scene where the couple get to meet Her Majesty the Queen of England, in all these scenes we are made to feel the emotions by avoiding all other possible distractions. The screen play goes in a predictable, steady pace while managing to sustain our interest.
Though the story is about a renowned Physicist who thrives on Mathematical equations and obscure theories, the screen play has kept it to the minimum, making us cherish the movie for the true characters that are portrayed, thus successfully avoiding of the film becoming a documentary.
I enjoyed the two dialogues shown to be spoken by Dr.Hawking near the end of the movie, one when he answers a question “Where there is life, there is Hope” and in the last scene when the couple, coming out of their audience with The Queen, saying to Jane pointing to their kids “Look what we made”. Both were touching.
Overall, a must watch and take your school going kids along, it will be a good influence for them.