The love life and deteriorating health of theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking...pretty gummy at times

Rating: 6/10 (10 May 2015)

Two British students at Cambridge University in 1962 fall in love: he's studying astrophysics and develops the controversial theory that a black hole created the universe; she hopes to get a degree in Medieval Spanish poetry, is charmed by him and desires to be his wife, despite his recent diagnosis with motor neuron disease. The life of "A Brief History in Time" author Stephen Hawking, with a screenplay adapted from Jane Hawking's book "Travelling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen," is glossy and professionally-assembled, right down to the romantic blue light that bathes the young lovers at the dance where they first meet. As Stephen Hawking, Oscar winner Eddie Redmayne is puckish and charming; it's a masterful performance that must carry the movie emotionally for quite a stretch, yet Redmayne is equal to the challenge. Playing his seemingly tireless spouse (who bore three of Stephen's children even while his muscles were rapidly failing), Felicity Jones has to play a saint, a daunting task. Jones is not required to show joy or splendor because, apparently, Jane Hawking was too busy being a nursemaid/wife/mother to be truly happy; the one sequence where Jones is allowed to brighten a bit is when Stephen, an atheist, first references God in his manuscript and shares the moment with her. The film isn't full of pomp and prestige--it's entertaining and moving--but the notion that Stephen is just a delightful, wily genius in a wheelchair is rather tough to swallow. "The Theory of Everything" isn't a puff piece on the physicist and author, but neither is it a probing investigation of the man behind those theories. **1/2 from ****