To look into the face of god
Pi A Film Review By Michael Redman Copyright 1998 By Michael Redman
*** (Out of ****)
It is the hope of every man, woman and child on the face of the planet that there is something out there, somewhere, that makes sense of life. If we could only discover the secret of the universe, everything would fall into place.
Shamen throughout the ages have searched for that arcane answer in varied places: drugs, alcohol, religion, the occult, sex, isolation. Those who are afraid of learning the truth use the same methods to hide from it.
Maximillian Cohen (Sean Gullette) has been looking for a way to put chaos into order all of his life. Now he may have found it.
Pi is the number that represents the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. 3.14... and on into infinity, the number has no end. Just like the circle itself, just like the universe. It's connected to the never-ending golden spiral: the pattern of shells, fingerprints, sunflowers and the our galaxy itself.
When Max was a child his mother told him not to stare into the sun. Of course he did. When his vision returned he was a changed person. He has devoted his existence to staring into his sun: mathematics. Forsaking virtually all human contact and every other aspect of his life, he's looking for the numerical formula that explains everything. He even ignores an apparent invitation from the attractive woman next door for more intimate contact.
This film's mad scientist lives completely surrounded by his computer. Not just any computer, this machine is an entity unto itself. Pieces of it are everywhere. Ribbon cables snake up the walls to shelves on the other side of the room. Stacks of electronic stuff reach the ceiling. Max's claustrophobic apartment is like a scene out of "Brazil" with an amphetamine drip.
When a bug -- the machine is infested with ants -- causes a chip meltdown, the printer spits out a 216-digit number. At first Max dismisses it as garbage. Then he becomes involved with a group of Hasidic Jews who are using Kabalistic mathematics to decode the Torah trying to discover the true name of God which happens to be a 216-digit number. Vicious Wall Street businessmen are after him because this number can predict the stock market. His mentor mentions a 216-digit number that he found while investigating the nature of pi.
Max's obsession seems to have lead him to the truth and now everyone wants what's inside his head.
"Pi" is a difficult to watch. The frantic pace of the grainy high contrast overly-exposed black and white visuals is hard on the eyes. The harsh electronic score sets the audience on edge. It all works perfectly to illustrate Max's slide into insanity.
Director Darren Aronofsky has achieved a miracle. With a budget of a mere $60,000 raised by asking friends for $100 each, he created a singular vision of obsession that won the Sundance Best Director award.
Obsession may be one way to truth, but staring into the face of god can also burn out your vision. As the film demonstrates, there are some secrets that most of us would rather not know.
(Michael Redman has written this column for over 23 years and, if you excuse him, he's going out to stare into the sun for a while. You can stare into the electrons at Redman@indepen.com.)
[This appeared in the 10/15/98 "Bloomington Independent", Bloomington, Indiana. Michael Redman can be contacted at Redman@indepen.com.] -- mailto:redman@indepen.com This week's film review at http://www.indepen.com/ Film reviews archive at http://us.imdb.com/M/reviews_by?Michael%20Redman
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