Film Reviews

Creation

• Rating:
• Director: Jon Amiel
• Starring: Jennifer Connolly
• Details: UK / 108mins (PG).

"You have killed God, sir, and I for one am glad to be rid of the vindictive bugger." Creation documents, we're told, Charles Darwin's attempt to write The Origin Of Species, is a publication that still divides creationists and evolutionists today. In actuality, however, the film is more concerned about Darwin and his wife's attempt to come to terms with the death of their child. There's an air of familiarity to Creation: didn't Bettany play a Darwin-esque character in Master & Commander, and didn't Connolly play the supportive-but-worried wife in A Beautiful Mind (which also starred Bettany)?
The writing of The Origin Of Species is killing the reclusive Charles Darwin (Bettany), and his theories that God didn't create the universe drives a wedge between him and his wife Emma (Connolly), while close friend Rev. Innes (Northam) does his best to coax him back into the flock. But his agnosticism comes more from the death of his beloved daughter Annie (West, daughter of The Wire's Dominic) as much as his research. As Charles' faith slips away, along with his health, Emma clings to hers.
Bettany plays a likeable Darwin; a loving father torn between science, the furore that he's 'killed God' (a mantle he's uncomfortable with), and the hollow thought that his daughter is not in heaven but lying in the cold ground. This causes friction in his mind and with Emma (adding to the guilt that, because they are first cousins it might have facilitated Anna's physical weakness). But this drama, which is the heart of the story, takes an age to come about. When it does, it's a heartbreaker, but it's missing from the bulk of the story. Where Amiel's script works in keeping the creation vs. evolution debate at bay (which could have got very boring very quickly), it spends too much time with Darwin huddled over his pages, or sick in bed, or staring off into the distance. This doesn't make for interesting drama but Bettany, and later Connolly (when she's allowed), lifts Amiel's film from its self-imposed stiffness with a decent turn.

Review by Gavin Burke