Review of The Zero Theorem (2013) by Jayakrishnan R — 28 Jul 2014

43%.

Saw this on 29/7/14.

The main reason why I watched this film is because of the fact that I got it long before it's release, that was quite fascinating, a good director's flick whose pirated versions run wild on the internet. But this film however turns out to be the worst film of Terry Gilliam that I have seen so far. I have extremely enjoyed the director's Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus(2009), 12 Monkeys(1995) and Brothers Grimm. Zero theorem doesn't lack the visual spurs of the usual Gilliam movies, but what it lacks is in it's plot and script like it's bland premise.

Zero Theorem is one which tells that there is no point of existence, the universe expands itself into a black hole, eventually leading itself to extinction. Like this premise, the film too doesn't have coherence. Instead of trying to clarify the theorem for the audience, they simply complicate it using mathematical relations and visual effects( too good for a 10 million project). The only words that the film keep on throwing constantly at you are 'Crunching Entities", the meaning of which I never really understood. The film tells it's story in a near by future( because Facebook still exists) and the characters in it are poorly developed, for example the protagonist is as lunatic as the logic in the premise. The film portrays it's antiheroes, The Management, played by Matt Damon as one with supreme control and one that invokes fear in minds who disobey them, but the reason for the antihero's behavior or their need for proving Zero theorem is poorly explained as is every thing about them, although the only interesting thing about this film is the Management, the antagonist referred in a plural term, but played by 1 actor alone, just like how the protagonist refers himself as "we" instead of "I". The real problem in this film is the director's approach, the director is basically an unorthodox fantasy film maker. The biggest advantage of fantasy is that it requires no reason, but sci-fi films require logic and reason. However the director adapts a sci-fi theme and carelessly throws in fantasy elements that never satisfies the fans of both genre, unlike the director's sci-fi work 12 Monkeys. Zero Theorem on the whole strands instead in the middle of no where, hopes that it could at least find the black hole it was searching for.