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Pi
1999
Low-budget film that won Aronofsky "Best Director" at 1998's Sundance Film Festival. Gritty, inventive black-and-white photography drives this story of genius mathematician Max Cohen who is exploring the possible existence of discernible patterns in the stock market. With the aid of Euclid, his home grown supercomputer, Max .. Read more
| Starring | Sean Gullette, Mark Margolis, Ben Shenkman, Samia Shoaib |
|---|---|
| Director | Darren Aronofsky |
| Genres | Drama |
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Pi
Low-budget film that won Aronofsky "Best Director" at 1998's Sundance Film Festival. Gritty, inventive black-and-white photography drives this story of genius mathematician Max Cohen who is exploring the possible existence of discernible patterns in the stock market. With the aid of Euclid, his home grown supercomputer, Max stumbles upon a bug that crashes his system and spits out a seemingly meaningless number. A knowledgeable friend gives him insight using the ancient game of Go and warns of the spiritual ramifications of powerful numbers. A Hasidic cabalistic sect and representatives from an extremely powerful Wall Street firm then attempt to extract the number from him, by whatever means necessary, for their own ill-gotten gains.
| Starring | Sean Gullette, Mark Margolis, Ben Shenkman, Samia Shoaib, Pamela Hart, Joanne Gordon |
|---|---|
| Director | Darren Aronofsky |
| Studio | PATHE DISTRIBUTION |
| Run time | DVD: 1 hr 20 mins |
| Certificate | |
| Genres | Drama |
| Language | DVD: English |
| Released | DVD: not available Production year: 1999 |
| Format | DVD |
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Critics' reviews (6)
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In this fascinating thriller, Sean Gullette plays a reclusive maths genius who becomes obsessed with the notion that everything in the universe can be broken down into mathematics and therefore follows a predictable pattern. Shot in black-and-white and marking the feature debut of Darren Aronofsky, it's filled with complex issues (can Gullette's “gift” be used to decipher the true name of God?) and makes arresting use of disorientating camerawork to depict Gullette's distorted view of the world. But, despite its many virtues, Pi becomes increasingly hard to follow because of an overload of intricate ideas that could baffle even Stephen Hawking.
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"...Ingeniously cerebral, playfully twisted....A tour-de-force of grainy, high-contrast black-and-white photography and inventive editing and sound design..."
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Most helpful member's review
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30 out of 34 people found this review helpful
Furious Invention.
Darren Aronofsky has taken a defiantly unfilmable story and created something really quite startling. The film documents mathematician Max's struggle with both his sanity and the mysterious Pi, the enigmatic ratio of a circle's circumference to diameter. Max believes that Pi holds the key to discerning hidden structures in the universe and to this end he is pursued by a multinational finance company who hope his discovery will lead to complete mastery of the global stock market.
Reminiscent of early David Lynch (especially Eraserhead), Pi is shot in gloriously dense, grainy black and white. The light is uniformly harsh, throwing deep, chiascuro shadows and rendering liquids positively mercurial.
Despite it's surrealist leanings, the film is strongly characterised and plotted, with more than a nod toward film noir traditions. The cerebral script is wonderfully visualised and you are left appreciating just what you can do with a hand-held camera, an intelligent script and a lot of imagination. -
Most recent members' review
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1 out of 1 person found this review helpful
[Highly rated reviewer]
Good Film But..
Low budget has its place and many people will really like this film. However, it didn't quite do it for me.
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News and features
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The Fountain
- 19 Jan 2007
It's been six years since Darren Aronofsky wowed a generation of young filmgoers with his sensational treatment of addiction, Requiem for a Dream. Now he's back with a stab at the kind of personal, visionary cinema his new-found reputation seemed to demand: a metaphysical sci-fi movie starring Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz (Mrs Aronofsky). Delayed and truncated by the ankling of Brad Pitt some years ago, The Fountain turns out to be three terrible films for the price of one. There's no... Read more
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Pi
Low-budget film that won Aronofsky "Best Director" at 1998's Sundance Film Festival. Gritty, inventive black-and-white photography drives this story of genius mathematician Max Cohen who is exploring the possible existence of discernible patterns in the stock market. With the aid of Euclid, his ...
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