DVD review: Creation

The story of Charles Darwin.

This is an extremely well made movie. A period drama starring Charles Darwin and his family that tries to tackle the subject of what a devout Christian like Darwin, and his wife, would have felt about the publication of “The origin of the species”, without any doubt a most damaging book for religion in general.

There is not a lot of interesting debates about the subject sadly but throughout the movie, probably thanks to the very good performances from Bettany and Connelly, we really get to feel the distress that Darwin discoveries brought to him and his family.

Although strangely the movie, instead of focusing on this very interesting thing, spends an inordinate amount of time on the relationship between Darwin and his eldest daughter, Anne. This is certainly not a bad thing in itself, it’s a really touching story, I just wonder why concentrate on this when you have a much juicier subject at hand. I can understand that there is a thematic relationship, that we naturally question the role and the very existence of god when a tragedy befalls, but I honestly believe that the filmmakers wanted a tragedy to make us care because they were scared that the movie would have been too intellectual.

Having said that this is still a superb period drama. The rural English setting is gorgeous, all the actors give very good performances. Real life husband and wife Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly are spotless as Charles and Emma Darwin, Bettany is at his career’s best.

The script is very well written and even if it doesn’t really approach the thorny question of faith vs science it work perfectly on every emotional level. The assured direction, from none other than the director of “The core” how ironic, is just the icing of the cake.

Highly recommended.