Creation
Creation is a romantic drama about the origin of the Origin of the Species. Huh? That’s right Charles Darwin (Paul Bettany) wrote his revolutionary earth shattering theory in the throes of romantic turmoil. And not romantic in the highs-seas-adventure sense of the word. By the time Darwin put quill to paper he was long passed stumping after turtles and puffins in the Galapagos. Twenty years later in his stately country manor he’s pressed by his agnostic scientific cohorts to publish his data but his wife Emma (Jennifer Connelly) is worried about religious persecution from a church that she’s aligned with. She also happens to be his first cousin and he’s wracked with guilt that if his theory is right such close breeding may have been responsible for the poor health of two of his children, particularly his stricken oldest child Annie (Martha West) with whom he has numerous therapeutic and cathartic discussions both real and imagined. The film’s pace at times equals that of scientific data being analysed but it remains a fascinating insight not only into a time of absurd beliefs both religious and scientific that was only a few generations ago but also into the unknown life of a household name who despite the feathers he ruffled still lies in Westminster Abbey with the full blessing of the church.