Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 20, 1993 TAG: 9302200303
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CHRIS GLADDEN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
`HISTORY OF TIME' A SHOW-AND-TELL FILM
Does the universe have a beginning? Will it end? Why on Earth is it here to begin with?These are a few of the questions addressed in "A Brief History of Time," the fascinating and sometimes mind-boggling documentary about physics superstar Stephen Hawking.
Hawking is a rarity. Seldom do scientists become best-selling writers. But Hawking's slim volume - from which the movie takes its title - is an examination of the nature of time that became a popular hit.
Master documentary director Errol Morris not only takes us on a tour of some of the more extraordinary and provocative theories in modern physics, he uses his distinctive style to tell the story of the remarkable British scientist. Morris ("The Thin Blue Line") is a show-and-tell director.
He shows audiences the points of the theories involved through clever graphics, and he tells the story of Hawking - and modern physics - through interviews with Hawking, his friends and family and his colleagues.
Hawking was a brilliant but unmotivated student at Oxford in the 1960s when he was struck by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease.
Doctors said he would eventually have the body of a cabbage but his mental processes wouldn't be affected. They gave him 2 1/2 years to live, but this theoretician of time just kept on ticking.
Hawking's mother borrows a quote from Samuel Johnson and notes that the doctors' news concentrated Hawking's mind wonderfully. He set to work on theories that interested him, at first working in the framework of Einstein's general theory of relativity. But new discoveries soon gained his attention. He started thinking about the newly discovered black holes and the theories of quantum mechanics, which Einstein rejected because they allow for chance in laws of nature.
Eventually, Hawking became almost completely paralyzed except for some slight movement in his hands. When his voice went, he started speaking through a computer connected to his wheelchair. That's the way we see this courageous seeker of knowledge in the movie.
Hawking's body may be imprisoned by disease. But he acknowledges no confinement of the human mind. He is still after that one Holy Grail of science: a single theory that explains why the universe exists. It will be the ultimate act of human reason because we will know the mind of God, he says. Showing at the Grandin Theatre (345-6177). Unrated, but there is no violence, strong language or sexual content; 85 minutes.
A Brief History of Time: ***1/2