[REVIEW] The Theory of Everything: The Story of Jane and Stephen Hawking

However bad life may seem, where there is life there is hope. – Stephen Hawking 

Stephen Hawking was a normal, healthy, young man in the 1960s. As a cosmology student – not to be confused with a cosmetology student – at Cambridge, Stephen (portrayed by Eddie Redmayne of Les Misérables) had high hopes of discovering the one singular answer to explain everything.

Even though the story is about one of the smartest men of our time, it isn’t really about science. It gives you enough science to think about, but not too much to really scare anyone away. The film is based on the memoir Travelling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen by Jane Hawking and is directed by Academy Award winner James Marsh (Man on Wire). The acting was fantastic; I believed not only that the man on the screen had a motor neuron disease but also the depth and complexities of his life, and the lives of everyone around him.

Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones are great on camera together and play their roles beautifully. You are able to put yourself into Jane’s shoes so effortlessly, and it makes you look at your own trials a little differently. It leaves you respecting both Jane and Stephen for their fierce determination to press forward despite what life brings you. 

This would be an especially great film to see with someone who is a science lover or biography buff. It will leave you thinking for days after.

4 stars