A Brief History of Time (1991)

User Rating:

7.4/10   

Director:

Errol Morris

Writer:

Stephen Hawking (book)

Release Date:

16 October 1992 (Australia)

Genre:

Documentary | Biography

Tagline:

Where did the universe come from? Will time ever come to an end? Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

Plot:

A film about the life and work of the cosmologist, Stephen Hawking, who despite his near total paralysis, is one of the great minds of all time.

Plot Keywords:

Physics | Paralysis | Cosmology | Astronomy | Professor

Awards:

4 wins

Cast

Isobel Hawking	...	Herself - Stephen Hawking's Mother
Stephen Hawking	...	Himself
Janet Humphrey	...	Herself - Stephen Hawking's Aunt
Mary Hawking	...	Herself - Stephen Hawking's Sister
Basil King	...	Himself - Hawking Family Neighbor
Derek Powney	...	Himself - Hawking Classmate at Oxford
Norman Dix	...	Himself - Hawking Classmate at Oxford
Robert Berman	...	Himself - Hawking Tutor at Oxford
Gordon Berry	...	Himself - Hawking Classmate at Oxford
Roger Penrose	...	Himself - Professor at Cambridge
Dennis Sciama	...	Himself - Professor at Cambridge
John Wheeler	...	Himself - Astrophysicist
Brandon Carter	...	Himself - Astrophysicist
John Taylor	...	Himself - Astrophysicist
Kip Thorne	...	Himself - Research Scientist at Cambridge

Runtime:

80 min

Country:

UK | Japan | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White | Color (Eastmancolor)

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

Australia:M | Finland:S | Germany:6 | Sweden:Btl | USA:G

Filming Locations:

Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England, UK

Company:

Amblin Entertainment

Trivia:

Appearances to the contrary, all interviews were filmed on sets built for the movie.

Quotes:

Stephen Hawking: I wanted to understand how the universe began.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Gilmore Girls: Knit, People, Knit! (#7.9)" (2006)

An attempt to (somewhat) humanize time, space, and the universe

Stephen Hawking has one of the greatest minds, or if that's too simplistic to coin for him one of the most curious and daring, that also happens to be trapped in a body crippled by a disease that leaves him in a wheelchair and a computer to communicate. Perhaps I didn't know enough about Hawking going in (I always knew him as 'that guy speaking like a computer who knows a lot about like, the universe and stuff, you know') that he is British, that he was a rather normal kid, and, perhaps most remarkably, the disease that could have possibly left him dead at 21 put him in the position of putting his life in focus.

According to Errol Morris's equally curious and coolly, visually dazzling portrait in A Brief History of Time, Hawking was already brilliant, in spurts (when other Oxford students were faced with daunting algebraic equations, he answered more than three times the amount in an hour's time), but when faced with challenges, mostly from other theories by other scientists, he bounced back with his own. Beneath some of the complex scientific talk- and if you got any less than a B- in astronomy, like me, you'll need to keep your ears especially perked up in explanations of time's possible infinity or the peculiarities of the black hole- there's a human being who just wants to enjoy his goose on his birthday.

Morris captures Hawking just right for those who can't get enough of his theories on how particles may be going in and out of a black hole, or if there is even a creator or not depending on how much one takes into account Einstein and time. But he also captures the back-story on the man and his condition, which creates this as something much more interesting than if Morris had done one or the other. Too much talk about the cosmos would make one's head hurt, and too much about his personal life and one might wonder what all the fuss is about this bloke who's book of the film's title was on bestseller lists for over five years.

Almost in spite of his appearance, Hawking defines what it is to be a conscious entity in a universe which, he observes, he won't be apart of if and when the universe goes kaput another 10 billion years from now. Through it all, in A Brief History of Time, we get a glimpse of a genius and his humility (not to mention his colleagues and family's' ten cents here and there) through an unfathomably hypothetical and mathematical thought process of the universe.