Movie Notes: Proof

June 7th, 2007

Proof

= 4 stars

Starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Jake Gyllenhall, Hope Davis
Directed by John Madden

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I was pleasantly surprised by this cerebral film based on a play. Its stage roots are retained in a basic, minimalist approach, with just four characters and few locations. This means the focus is on acting and dialogue, which are expertly handled. The plot is moved along with a core mystery, and I even found myself contemplating the film’s multiple meanings of the word “proof” well after the credits rolled.

The original, Pulitzer Prize-winning play was written by David Auburn. Gwyneth Paltrow starred in a version staged in London.

The character quartet consists of Catherine (Gwyneth Paltrow), her sister Claire (Hope Davis), their father Robert (Anthony Hopkins), and mathematics student Hal (Jake Gyllenhaal). Recently deceased, Robert only appears in flashback form. Catherine was her father’s caretaker for several years - as he sunk into dementia - side-railing her own aspirations as a mathematics student. When the successful (at least by yuppie standards) Claire arrives to put things back together, there is an understandable amount of resentment on Catherine’s part. Lastly, Hal has been sorting through Robert’s stacks of frazzled notebooks, and discovers a mathematical proof of great value.

Claire’s big town vapidity and predilection for “to-do” lists contrast with Gwyneth’s free-form edge-of-sanity wandering. Jake Gyllenhaal has a similar wide-eyed interest in the intellect, which is really needed to sell the value of the proof he has discovered. But above all, I was really impressed with Paltrow’s emotional range. Yes, she can act!

Also notable is how Proof portrays intellectual thought. Several recent films display contemplation with zooming CGI numbers materializing around the character’s head while the camera rotates and music swells (A Beautiful Mind, Bee Season, The Da Vinci Code). Proof refreshingly avoids such contrivances with nothing more than a studious individual hunched over a notebook scribbling ideas with pencil on paper, and importance is demonstrated by waving said notebook frantically at others, or to professors who massage their chins knowingly.

The core mystery is whether Robert really wrote the mathematical proof uncovered by Hal. Both he and Claire begin to wonder if perhaps Catherine is the author.

This is where “proof” comes to mean more than just the mathematical variety. Robert was motivated to write the proof to prove he was still a great mathematician. Hal seeks proof of authorship. Claire likewise demands proof from her sister. When she first arrives in town, she doesn’t believe Hal exists until she meets him in person.

Catherine wonders why Hal doesn’t believe her side of the story, and grows frustrated with Hal’s insistence on factual verification. It seems she craves the opposite of concrete proof: faith, as everyone seems incapable of having in her.

In a sense, Proof’s four characters are caught up in requiring varying levels of validation to form their world views or establish their life’s purpose. Part of us is always wondering, why am I here? What must I do during my life to prove that I have a reason to exist? That my life wasn’t squandered?

But I think the real statement is how this quest for validation can bankrupt us emotionally. With her systematic, procedural check lists, Claire is actually the most emotionally devoid character - her life’s purpose seems to be to check off those items.

Whatever will she do once that list is completed? I wonder the same thing about myself.