Movie Review: The Zero Theorem

The Zero Theorem 

Starring: Christoph Waltz, Mélanie Thierry, David Thewlis, Lucas Hedges, Matt Damon, Tilda Swinton 

Director: Terry Gilliam 

Sony Pictures, Stage 6 Films, Voltage Pictures, Zanuck Independent, Zephyr Films, United Kingdom, Romania, 2013. 

The near future looks bright and chaotic with surveillance cameras and intruding advertising billboards that follow you everywhere. Qohen Leth (Christoph Waltz) is working at ManCom corporation. The work consists of crunching entities (trying to solve vaguely Rubik's cube looking mathematical problems). He is waiting for a call that would explain the purpose of life. He speaks of himself in plural form. He is requesting a disability leave because he thinks he is dying. The request is denied but he is given Shrink-ROM therapy software. 

Adverts follow everywhere

Qohen at th physical examination

Dr. Shrink-ROM

The Management (Matt Damon) is going to a party, and Qohen is invited also but he would rather stay home waiting for the call. The Management thinks he is insane but assigns him to a new project, solving Zero Theorem. At the party Qohen also meets a flirtatious girl Bainsley (Mélanie Thierry). 

Qohen goes to the smart-phone party

The Management likes to blend with the background

Qohen meets Bainsley

Qohen can now start working from his home, an old empty church. The project is known to be very wearing and Qohen's superior Joby (David Thewlis) and 15-year old hardware specialist Bob (Lucas Hedges) guess that Qohen won't last long. BTW Joby looks and acts quite a lot like Michael Palin, and is also a jolly chap. 

Christmas. Joy.

Joby visits Qohen

Solving equations looks cool

After months of work Qohen hasn't managed to solve the problem and gets frustrated. He starts having nightmares about black hole. Bob is sent to repair his computer. Also Bainsley visits and invites Qohen to her erotic virtual reality website. 

Virtual reality holiday

Hardware guru Bob

Basically the philosophical movie is about a man who is fearing emptiness trying to find the meaning of his life. However there might not be one, and the way Qohen differs from the other people in the movie is that he is unable to accept it. Religious, philosophical and technological and ideas are used here. 

Everything is banned here

Batman is the new Messiah

The Zero Theorem is the final part of Terry Gilliam's dystopian scifi trilogy, the other parts being Brazil and 12 Monkeys. Of the Gilliam's trilogy this is not as dark as the previous movies. The world is very detailed with lots of fun stuff at the background. It pays to watch the movie again and read the funny/surreal news bulletins and adverts that sometimes resemble some news of the recent years. Some picks of those are "Fear over horse meat in ice cream freezers" or "Corgi puppies eat Queen's passport" or "Tiny robot apes quit Tweezy production line." There is also "Occupy Mall Street" autumn sale. There are also some Monty Python-based references such as "Sit on my Facebook." Some famous actors appear in small roles. Tilda Swinton appears as Dr. Shrink-ROM, a psychiatric software and Peter Stormare as a doctor. Robin Williams has a cameo role as Church of Batman the Redeemer Billboard Spokesman.

Rating: Very good