A historical drama set in Roman Egypt, concerning a slave who turns to the rising tide of Christianity in the hopes of pursuing freedom while also falling in love with his master, the famous female philosophy and mathematics professor Hypatia of Alexandria.
Keep track of everything you watch; tell your friends.
If your account is linked with Facebook and you have turned on sharing, this will show up in your activity feed. If not, you can turn on sharing
here
.
Set in northern Australia before World War II, an English aristocrat who inherits a sprawling ranch reluctantly pacts with a stock-man in order to protect her new property from a takeover plot. As the pair drive 2,000 head of cattle over unforgiving landscape, they experience the bombing of Darwin, Australia, by Japanese forces firsthand.
A seventeen-year-old aristocrat, expecting to be married to a rich claimant by her mother, falls in love with a kind but poor artist aboard the luxurious, ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic.
Director:
James Cameron
Stars:
Leonardo DiCaprio,
Kate Winslet,
Billy Zane
A young American studying in Paris in 1968 strikes up a friendship with a French brother and sister. Set against the background of the '68 Paris student riots.
In 1933 New York, an overly ambitious movie producer coerces his cast and hired ship crew to travel to mysterious Skull Island, where they encounter Kong, a giant ape who is immediately smitten with leading lady Ann Darrow.
A young queen, who is married to an insane king, falls secretly in love with her physician - and together they start a revolution that changes a nation forever.
Alexandria, 391 AD: Hypatia teaches astronomy, mathematics, and philosophy. Her student Orestes is in love with her, as is Davus, her personal slave. As the city's Christians, led by Ammonius and Cyril, gain political power, the institutions of learning may crumble along with the governance of slavery. Jump ahead 20 years: Orestes, the city's prefect, has an uneasy peace with Christians, led by Cyril. A group from the newly empowered Christians has now taken to enforce their cultural hegemony zealously; first they see the Jews as their obstacle, then nonbelievers. Hypatia has no interest in faith; she's concerned about the movement of celestial bodies and "the brotherhood of all". Although her former slave doesn't see it that way. Written by
<jhailey@hotmail.com>
During the Jewish slaughter, you can see a Prickly Pear (Indian fig) cactus in the streets of Alexandria. They were introduced in the Mediterranean area only after the discovery of America. See more »
Quotes
Hypatia:
Ever since Plato, all of them - Aristarchus, Hipparchus, Ptolemy - they have all, all, all tried to reconcile their observations with circular orbits. But what if another shape is hiding in the heavens?
Davus:
Another shape? Lady, there is no shape more pure than the circle; you taught us that.
Hypatia:
I know, I know, but suppose - just suppose! - the purity of the circle has blinded us from seeing anything beyond it! I must begin all over with new eyes. I must rethink everything!... What if we dared to look ...
See more »
This is arguably the best film of 2009, depending on whether or not you understand the filmmaker's perspective. I believe, in some ways, full appreciation of this film can only be achieved if you have watched a completely unrelated work: "Cosmos", by Carl Sagan.
Both the Library of Alexandria and Hypatia were terms that constantly came up in Cosmos; and although it is unclear if Sagan had any influence in the making of this film, it really embodied Sagan's philosophy. For example, there are a lot of aerial shots, looking at the Earth from afar - often during dramatic scenes of either love or violence that shows both how insignificant and how precious the human existence is. In spite of all our wars and hate and differences, we are all being carried on this lone blue vessel, journeying through the vast emptiness of space. Are we really that different? Or do more things unite us than divide us, like Hypatia says? In a moment of sheer ignorance, men can destroy their own proudest and most beautiful achievements and erase all of their accumulated knowledge. It's happened before, and it could happen again. This film delivered this message with beautiful precision - are we naive, like Orestes of Alexandria, to think we have finally changed? Or should we look at ourselves in the mirror and know that we still have a long road ahead to better ourselves? The choice is up to us.
91 of 158 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful to you?
This is arguably the best film of 2009, depending on whether or not you understand the filmmaker's perspective. I believe, in some ways, full appreciation of this film can only be achieved if you have watched a completely unrelated work: "Cosmos", by Carl Sagan.
Both the Library of Alexandria and Hypatia were terms that constantly came up in Cosmos; and although it is unclear if Sagan had any influence in the making of this film, it really embodied Sagan's philosophy. For example, there are a lot of aerial shots, looking at the Earth from afar - often during dramatic scenes of either love or violence that shows both how insignificant and how precious the human existence is. In spite of all our wars and hate and differences, we are all being carried on this lone blue vessel, journeying through the vast emptiness of space. Are we really that different? Or do more things unite us than divide us, like Hypatia says? In a moment of sheer ignorance, men can destroy their own proudest and most beautiful achievements and erase all of their accumulated knowledge. It's happened before, and it could happen again. This film delivered this message with beautiful precision - are we naive, like Orestes of Alexandria, to think we have finally changed? Or should we look at ourselves in the mirror and know that we still have a long road ahead to better ourselves? The choice is up to us.