marianpo
Although I agree with other reviewers that the reaction of the Feynman character to his wife's death is so restrained as to appear cold, that is but a minor flaw in a striking film featuring a fantastic performance by Patricia Arquette.I have seen many tearjerkers in my life, but this is one of the few that actually makes me choke up when I remember certain scenes.The characters' integrity, the tragic backdrop of the Manhattan Project, the revealing details, the respectful rendering of quaint aspects of the era, the simple truths simply portrayed all make this a small masterpiece.
chitowndale
This movie is a major disappointment to me. I looked forward to it after listening to many of Richard Feynman's Physics lectures. While doing a great job of showing the love between these two people, it totally misses out on showing Richard as a person unto himself. He is so unique that this is a massive oversight, to say the least. Despite his tragedy, I am sure he was just as irreverent and humorous during the Manhattan project as he was for the rest of his life. Yet only a couple of snippets show this irreverence and humor and even those are done badly. One is the repetitive exiting of the Los Alamos site to demonstrate the lousy security they had despite rigorous examination of everyone entering the site. The other was when he first met with the students in the data processing lab. That one too was far below what I'm sure the real Richard Feynman would have done, judging by how he treated his students in almost all of the lectures I have listened to.So Broderick took a whole person and cut him in half, only showing the intimate portion of his life and relationship with his wife that he loved so dearly. He almost completely left out the public persona of the man and this hurts the movie so badly that it never really recovers from it. It makes it a poor movie when it could have been a great movie, right up there with A Beautiful Mind. That is why I rated it a 3 instead of an 8 or 9 like it could have been.
tedg
Spoilers herein.Some theorists live in the world of their theories. If you are going to pay attention to people, these are the most worthwhile. And certainly if you are going to build a film around them, you have some pretty rich possibilities. That's because the best films - in my opinion - take you to an alternative world, and the world of these theorists is often wonderful indeed. Nash was one of these thinkers who lived in the world he created, which is why `Beautiful Mind' was such a disappointment. Feynmen was a different sort of beast altogether. For him, the world was real, and he lived in it. He was among the best at forming elegant models and describing them to others, but it was all from the solid foundation of him in the real world. So a film about him in an artificial film world is not possible, which is why Broderick's approach is so apt. The problem is that if you focus on him as a person, he is a pretty ordinary person.I suppose that's what the Brodericks wanted, a `small film' that they could manage. It is done well enough, especially the agent in disguise as an Indian. There's nothing wrong. It is just too slight. Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 4: Has some interesting elements.
VLeung
Cute and well meaning, if not exactly riveting. It should be given extra marks for trying very very hard not to be schmaltzy, even though it still is. British viewers may be reminded throughout of Frank Spencer - the modulation of Matthew Broderick's 'jewish' accent has distinctly ooh Bettyish notes.
AD
