Eddie Redmayne’s got one of those faces you either love or don’t, and we’re firmly in the don’t category, especially since the last time we saw his comically oversized features they were quivering every time he sang a note, tying Russell Crowe for The Worst Thing About the Les Mis Remake, Which Is Saying A Lot. Yet here we are now in full support of Redmayne’s performance as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything, which follows his life from an able-bodied student to the famous scientist we know now, and the woman (Felicity Jones) who loved him through all of it until he divorced her for his nurse. (Literally every man is a disappointment, eventually.) Jones gamely fleshes out Jane Hawking, the less showier of the roles, while Redmayne contorts then immobilizes his body with what looks like exhausting effort (don’t worry, he’ll be rewarded). James Marsh (Man on Wire) directs this very British slice of Oscar bait, and shades Anthony McCarten’s sturdy but by-the-numbers biopic script with some wonderful love scenes—both humour and poignancy really sneak up on you. In an era seriously lacking in serious movie stars, it’s great to see young actors like Jones and Redmayne get to go for broke in a movie that mostly deserves them.
