November 11, 2017 – My fellow critic here, Patrick Ivers, who teaches math by the way, raves about this movie. It is his favorite 2017 film so far, and it is easy to see why. It is very entertaining. Not believable, but very funny escapism nonetheless.

The gifted title refers to first-grader Mary Adler (played by Mckenna Grace) a “one in a billion” mathematics prodigy, daughter of yet another math prodigy. Mary's grandmother was also a talented mathematician. Her father, however, was just some guy. Mary is being raised by her uncle, Frank Adler (Chris Evans of “Captain America: Civil War”) who has kept her out of sight for years to keep Mary away from his mother, who has smothering ambitions for the child.

Frank's mother, Evelyn (played by Lindsay Duncan of “Birdman”) finally locates Frank and Mary and immediately tries to get legal custody of the child. She doesn't approve of the way that Frank is raising her. Frank wants Mary to have a normal childhood, to have friends, to laugh, play and interact with kids in a normal public school. Evelyn, whose own mathematical ambitions were thwarted by her husband, wants Mary to devote her life to solving great math riddles the way Mary's late mother did.

In court, the darker side of Evelyn's ambitions are revealed, how she dominated Mary's mother's emotional life. It is revealed that Evelyn used her influence to guide Mary's mother into a one-dimensional life focused on the pursuit of solving one of the hardest mathematical problems ever formulated, with tragic consequences. Frank's lawyer (played by Glenn Plummer of “The Day After Tomorrow ”) forces Evelyn to reveal on the stand that her daughter's happiness was far less important than her daughter's achievements (and that she has the same blind ambition for her granddaughter).

I know, this all sounds kind of dark and desperate, but what makes it entertaining are all the funny, terribly witty things that Frank says, and the cute, funny things that Mary says and does in the movie. Frank has an incredibly quick wit. He has a knack for saying really smart, perceptive, incisive things at exactly at the right time. He keeps his cool, cracking out devastating one-liners time and again, despite severe emotional pressures and distractions. This is not like real life, but is more like a guy who has memorized a script written by somebody who worked long and hard to come up with lots of funny glib things to say. It is not believable dialog, but man is it ever well-written.

Mckenna Grace, who plays Mary, doesn't behave in the way I expected a child math prodigy to act on screen, moody, withdrawn, introspective, socially awkward and at least a little bit autistic. She is outgoing, playful and has a very grown up sense of humor. Many of her observations and jokes about life are those I would expect an older, glib, adult with a lot of life experience to come up with, given time. Seems a bit off to me, but again, very entertaining dialog, written by the very grown up Tom Flynn (“Highboys and Lowboys”). In addition to the great writing, the film is very well directed by Marc Webb of “500 Days of Summer.”

But this film is more than just witty dialog, and good direction, the acting is really superb by the three main actors, along with Glenn Plummer, Octavia Spencer (“Hidden Figures”) and Jenny Slate (“Obvious Child”). Plummer plays Frank's lawyer, Spencer plays the next door neighbor and a babysitter for Mary and Slate plays Mary's teacher (and Frank's conflicted lover). Spencer, an Academy Award-winning actress, is great in this film, but her role seems a bit short-changed, like there should have been more scenes, or more dialog, to help explain why she is behaving like she is Mary's mother. I didn't even recognize Chris Evans, Captain America! He disappeared into this role. The beard helped.

Then there is the Hollywood ending to the story. It isn't believable, either, but I don't mind a Hollywood ending, as long as the film is entertaining, and this one certainly is. I laughed a lot during the course of this film, and I liked the way it ended, too. Sure, this is escapism, but I need it, given the depressing state of America and the world. This movie is a warm blanket on a cold night. It rates a B.

Copyright © 2017 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
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