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Rating: << 11:15 am. I reaffirm my hypotheses: 1) Mathematics is the language of nature. 2) Everything around us can be represented and explained through numbers. 3) By plotting these numbers, patterns emerge. Therefore, patterns exist everywhere in nature>>.
There are films that, from their very first emergence on celluloid, are destined to be remembered over time. They insinuate themselves, slowly and inexorably, into the fabric of our culture, into our frameworks, becoming solid points of reference for the future, dictating styles and highly influential standards.
It is not known if these were Darren Aronofsky's intentions from the beginning, a director who is certainly unique and unconventional, who in 1996 began writing a screenplay that would come to light two years later, under the title "Pi" (known to us as "Pi: The Theorem of Delirium"): a bold project, risky in its impact with the general public, created with limited resources but with a refined screenplay and documentation work behind it.
It’s difficult not only to summarize, but even to talk about the plot of the film: "Pi" is the story of a journey. A profound journey into the depths of the mind of Maximillian Cohen (an excellent Sean Gullette), a brilliant mathematician afflicted by incredibly powerful migraine crises (probably from having intensely stared at the sun as a child), perpetually locked up in his Chinatown apartment. Strongly convinced that the entire nature, and even human reality, can be interpreted in terms of mathematical and geometric laws, Max is desperately searching for a universal rule that allows him to predict stock market trends. With the help of powerful electronic calculators, he discovers a numerical series of about 200 digits, around which the interests of a group of Wall Street speculators and a Jewish congregation revolve. Maximillian will then be swept into a vortex of uncontrollable events, touching upon the greed and thirst for knowledge of modern man, jeopardizing his own mental health.
Aronofsky's film is surprising on two fronts. Certainly in terms of the themes addressed, which range from strict mathematical theorems to the most fanciful religious-esoteric contaminations. The viewer partakes in the protagonist's mental journey, which if at first seems tied to incontrovertible scientific theories, gradually becomes fascinated by the unknown, the mystical, the pure irrationality, learning at his own expense how dangerous the thirst for knowledge is, which on one hand makes man aware, on the other hand guides him hand in hand towards a dangerous abyss.
There's a lot to digest in the screenplay. But if at first encounter one feels confused, during the viewing one cannot help but become increasingly interested in the captivating theories on which the film is based. Mathematics is treated specifically, but the tone is in many points lightened by aforementioned esoteric and mysterious elements.
But the most praiseworthy aspect, in my opinion, is the technical one. Visually the film is astonishing, with hyperkinetic editing that parallels the frenetic mental movement with the physical one, among subway stations full of tunnels and bustling streets of Chinatown shot with a handheld camera that offers very interesting frames and visual solutions. The film is also permeated with numerous hallucination flashes of high symbolic value (the ants on the chips, the brain on the metro steps and in the sink, the man with bloody hands...) and disturbing sequences in which the young mathematician is torn by his migraine crises very close to epilepsy.
The cryptic ending, subject to countless interpretations more or less valid, rightfully ranks among the best sequences of all time, so dense with madness and perverse that it evokes both disgust and fascination in the viewer. Is it a negative or positive ending? Reality or metaphor? Each draws their personal conclusion.
A special mention also for the wonderful soundtrack, ranging from Aphex Twin to Massive Attack (the marvelous "Angel"), passing through Orbital, Clint Mansell, and Banco de Gaia: a backdrop of trip-hop and electronics that represents a perfect background to the work, with its being somewhat dark, somewhat a metropolitan fairy tale.
"Pi" is a film on which I cannot be objective. Not a film, but a mental journey to be interpreted and lived intensely, letting oneself be carried away by every single frame.
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