The Theory of Everything

My overall impression of this film: holy cow, there’s so much packed into one story! It feels like each scene could be it’s own movie. How to dive into this film?

First, a quick synopsis. For those of you who don’t know, Stephan Hawking is a famous cosmologist who has done some groundbreaking work on black holes and theories of time. The Theory of Everything ostensibly follows his quest find a formula that would be the succinct explanation for the existence of everything in the universe. What we really get is the story of a passionate, complicated relationship between two incredible people: Stephen Hawking and his first wife Jane Hawking. They meet at a New Years party in 1963 shortly before Hawking’s diagnosis with ALS. Jane refuses to leave him, and they marry in 1965. Jane supports him through twenty years of marriage, groundbreaking research, and two children. Stephen supports Jane through twenty years of caretaking, two children, and a pseudo affair. I won’t say more because I don’t want to totally spoil the movie (if you’re like me and aren’t current on Hawking history, there are some twists here).

The Theory of Everything is very moving in all the predictable ways. Still, this inspiration story is well told, and manages to pack some surprises into the details. For instance, the treatment of the relationship between Stephen, Jane and Jonathan (Stephen and Jane’s aid, and object of Jane’s affection) is amazingly tender, careful and full-hearted--totally unexpected in this traditional drama, and completely welcome. By the same token, the film was very even-handed with Stephen’s relationship with his nurse. No one is written off here, or painted as a villain. Everyone is human and developed, even if the central inspiration plot is something like a Hollywood fable.

The acting is superb, and Eddie Redmayne is fantastic as Stephen. But I kept thinking, who really deserves the Oscar here? Felicity Jones’ portrayal of Jane is so complicated, deep and studied, I was consistently fascinated by her. In many ways, Jane’s journey is darker and more surprising than her husband’s. It’s easy to identify with Stephen and empathize with him, and that is what the movie and the audience expect and count on. Put in his place you’d almost definitely follow the same path, if you could find his strength. Whereas step into Jane’s shoes and there are no easy answers or obvious choices. No two people, in Jane’s place, would make the same decisions or have the same reactions. The film doesn’t just gloss over her journey, but spends a surprising and welcome amount of time ruminating on her dilemma. Jones had a much less straightforward job to do, and knocked it out of the park. I hope she isn’t overlooked next to Redmayne.

Despite my (maybe admittedly feminist-y biased) greater interest in Jane, the truth is Jane and Stephen are curled around each other like night and day, and this is a truth the film fundamentally understands. You need one to understand the other. They are each of them superior and handicapped individuals. The thread that runs through their relationship is Hawking’s search for a unified theory of the universe, and we watch as they dance around this life goal, pushing and pulling, supporting and tearing each other down.

There is an interesting intersection between Jane and Stephen, and why I think they are so attracted to each other. Jane believes in God, while Stephen is a committed atheist. They both understand life as a mystery, but they cope with unknowing in opposite ways. Stephen is analytical, scientific, a cosmic sleuth. He deals with the uncertainty of the world by writing rules for it, and occasionally mocking it. Jane deals by reacting, accommodating, worshipping. Stephen orders his world around himself. Jane orders herself around her world.

These opposite personalities drive every point of the film. The first third of the movie, the true love story, seems cold and a bit off. As I was watching, I was confused by how awkward their first kiss was. How wrong it felt that Stephen basically ordered Jane around and decided when they would talk and how fast their relationship progressed, etc. And she just let him. But now I think this slightly wonky origin story of their relationship is a careful addition to the film. This old fashioned cliché of a romance is there to establish Stephen’s character—which is not nice. Brilliant, but not particularly compassionate. The audience must view Stephen as a developed individual, so later when he is trapped behind an almost frozen face, we can see him for the thinking, feeling, agent of his own will that he is. We must know his personality so we see him as a person, not an object, which he so very much resembles after his disease renders him immobile.

Jane’s trajectory, on the other hand, is opposite. Light and dark, as Stephen’s father quotes in the film, yin and yang, they are constantly at odds. Jane begins as an object, as a pretty thing that Stephen seems to look at as a new toy to be acquired. She happily sustains this impression, allowing Stephen to advance their relationship (or not, as he sees fit). That is, until his illness. This is the first time Jane objects to anything Stephen decrees. The first time she breaks any of his rules. He tells her to go, and she refuses. He tells her to go again, and she tells him that if she does, she’ll never come back again. She is no longer at his beck and call, there for him to summon or banish. She is no longer an object to be owned or controlled. And from there, as Stephen descends further and further into dependency, becoming more and more object-like, less and less animate; Jane becomes powerful, emotionally and physically strong, his and her own advocate. Where once he dominated, she grows to carry them both.

Beneath the traditional inspiration fable, The Theory of Everything is a commentary on the illusion of objectification. As women, as disabled people (and as people of color, which are admittedly sorely lacking here), we often feel acutely disenfranchised by our own community. But our differences and our trials don’t have to silence us. Our fates are not bound by stereotypes, prejudice, or pity. You don’t have to be controlled by the story people tell about you. You can tell your own. Stephen Hawking was given two years to live in 1963. He is still alive.

What truly elevates The Theory of Everything above standard Hollywood inspiration fare is it’s careful depiction of the plodding monotony of resistance. This is also what makes it truly inspirational. It shows us the grim work of surviving adversity, joys and tragedies and dead ends all included. After the wild idealism of their courtship and marriage, Stephen and Jane coped with his illness every single day. The fight was not over with one bloody, fantastic, super human battle. The problem wasn’t solved with one difficult and brave decision. Resistance is a series of tiny choices, small losses and victories, a daily battle called living that wears you down like water dripping onto a stone for a hundred years. And yet Stephen Hawking is still alive and pursuing his life’s work. Here is a lesson for us, we who fight small battles a hundred times a day: You don’t have to push boundaries so much as sustain the will to keep your hand outstretched against them. Stereotypes, predictions, even scientific theories are weak. They control us by convincing us that they are sacred. Have the courage to reach out and just touch your walls. This is easier and also harder than making one giant decision. Keep touching your boundaries, no matter what happens. Eventually they will crumble like stone before water.