You’re a kid. And after you have noted that 3 + 3 = 6, the first grade teacher asks you what 135 times 57 is. Almost immediately you answer: “7,695…the square root is 87.7 and change.”
You’re gifted. Or, rather, you are a bona fide math “prodigy”. In other words, really, really gifted.
The plot is rather familiar. Frank, while recognizing his niece is gifted, is determined to keep her in public school. Why? So that she can become a “normal” child. But Mary’s grandmother is equally determined to yank her out of the ordinary school environment and put her into an extraordinary school environment instead.
So, mother is pitted against son for custody of this very special little girl.
Meanwhile, “it emerges that Mary’s mother, Diane, had been a promising mathematician, dedicated to the Navier–Stokes problem (one of the unsolved Millennium Prize Problems) before taking her own life when Mary was six months old.”
My own daughter was gifted. She attended both Friends School and the Baltimore School For the Arts. But she was not a “prodigy”.
So, what’s the difference?
I’ll tell you one thing though, it is all but impossible for someone who is not a prodigy to understand what it must be like to possess the mind of someone who is. Why is their brain that way while your own brain is not? The part about genes and memes. Or genes vs. memes.
Then there is this part: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Prize_Problems
The part that will almost certainly be way, way, way, over your head.
IMDb
The Navier-Stokes problem mentioned in the movie is indeed one of the seven Millennium Prize problems in mathematics. Clay Mathematics Institute offered a US $1,000,000 prize to the first person providing a solution for a specific statement of the problem.
at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gifted_(film
trailer: youtu.be/tI01wBXGHUs
Gifted [2017]
Directed by Marc Webb
[b]Frank: Fred’s gonna be fine, no more argument, okay? We’ve discussed this ad nauseam.
Mary: What’s an nauseam?
Frank: You don’t know? Looks like someone needs school.
…
Frank [as Mary is about to board the school bus]: This is gonna be fun. You’re gonna meet kids today you can borrow money from the rest of your life.
…
Frank [to Roberta]: She has not friend her age. No social skills. She doesn’t know how to be a kid. Two nights ago she told me that even if Germany bails up the euro, there could still be worldwide depression.
…
Principal: Good morning, first graders.
Class: Good morning, Mrs. Davis.
Principal: Are you ready for a great year?
Class: Yes!
[Mary raises her hand]
Bonnie: Yes, Mary?
Mary: She’s the boss?
Bonnie: Mrs. Davis is our principal, okay.
Mary: Ok, now I want you to get on your phone and call Frank and tell him to get me out of here!
…
Bonnie: I think your daughter…I think Mary might be gifted…Today in math, she answered some really…
Frank: No, that’s…It’s not gifted…It’s Trachtenberg. Jakow Trachtenberg.
Bonnie: I’m sorry?
Frank: Spent seven years in a concentration camp. Developed the system to rapidly solve problems. It’s the Trachtenberg method.
Bonnie: But she is… I mean… She’s seven though.
Frank: I learned it when I was eight. Do I look gifted to you? It kinda went out of vogue since the invention of the calculator. But… I can still win a drink at the bar using it.
…
Frank: I realize, putting a girl like Mary in Oaks Academy for Gifted Education … You know, 99 times out of a 100, that’s is what you do. It’s the Oaks. It’s great school. I looked into it. This family has a history with those schools. And I think the last thing that little girl needs is reinforcement that she’s different. Trust me, she knows, so I think Mary…I think she’s gotta be here. Today’s bad ending, you can’t hit people. But a 12 year old bullies a 7 year old and she stands up? Do you know how important that is to me that she did that? You know how proud I am of her? Aren’t you?
Principal: Mr. Edgar, your daughter shattered a young boy’s…
Frank: I know. You can’t hit people. That will be made very clear to her. I get that. But Miss Davis, if we separate our leaders… if we segregate them from people like you and me…you get congressmen.
…
Principal: Keeping Mary here is a mistake. We’ll never be able to raise this child to the level of scholarship she deserves.
Frank: Well…dumb her down to a decent human being. Everybody wins.
…
Mary [as they pull up to the house]: There’s a lady standing in front of our door.
Frank: Who is it?
Mary: How should I know? I’m seven.
Frank [looking at the woman]: That would be your grandmother.
Mary: Holy shit!
…
Evelyn [grandmother]: Frank, please listen to reason. At some point, are you gonna get to conclusion… or someone in authority are going to spell it out for you that the child best interest is all that matters…She’s not normal. And threating her such is negligence on a grand scale. I know your heart’s in the right place on this. But you are denying the girl her potential. I can provide for her. I can enrich her life.
Frank: Come on, Evelyn. You’re gonna take that girl, you are gonna bury her in tutors…then you’ll loan her out to some think tank where she could talk non-trivial zeros with a bunch of old Russian guys for the rest of her life.
Evelyn: And you’d bury her under a rock. Look, I didn’t expect you to understand the price you have to pay for greatness.
Frank: I do. That’s why I have Mary in the first place.
…
Mary: Is there a God?
Frank: I don’t know.
Mary: Just tell me.
Frank: I would if I could. But I don’t know. Neither does anybody else.
Mary: Roberta knows.
Frank: No. Roberta has faith… And that’s the great thing to have. But faith’s about what you think, feel. Not what you know.
Mary: What about Jesus?
Frank: Love that guy. Do what he says.
Mary: But, is he God?
Frank: I don’t know. I have an opinion. But that’s my opinion and I could be wrong. So why would I screw up yours? Use your head. But don’t be afraid to believe in things either.
Mary: Huh. There was a guy on TV who said there was no God.
Frank: The only difference between the atheists on TV and Roberta is, Roberta loves you. She trying to help. Tell you what though. One way or another we all end up back together in the end. That’s what you’re asking, right?
Mary: Yep.
Frank: Okay. Find something else to worry about, will ya?
Mary: All right.[/b]
In other words, not even being a prodigy is of much use here.
[b]Roberta [to Frank]: I told you something like this would happen. Now look where we are. And I’m supposed to believe you know what you’re doing. You couldn’t even find a white lawyer…There’s nothing you can say that’s make me fell good because I have no say in any of this, Frank. I’m not a blood relative, I’m not a legal guardian. I’m nothing. Just the lady who lives next door, whose opinion means nothing, whose feelings means nothing. Would I like to have Mary tonight? I’d like to have Mary every night.
…
[b]Mary: So what’s this problem I’m supposed to look at?
Evelyn: I don’t know.
Mary: So, it’s like a problem mom worked on?
Evelyn: Your mother didn’t work on problems. She worked on just one problem.
Mary: Just one? Her entire life?
Evelyn: Most of it.
…
Evelyn [before plaques on a wall]: Look. These are Millennium Prize problems. Seven great and meaningful problems. Some mathematicians have worked their entire lives to prove them.
Mary: Who’s the dude with the beard?
Evelyn: That’s not a dude. That’s Grigori Perelman. He proved Poincare conjecture. The only one of the seven proved. This…This is your mother’s problem. Navier- Stokes.
Mary: No picture. She didn’t solve it?
Evelyn: No. She was close. She would have won Fields Medal and probably shared the Nobel, considering what would meant for physics.
Mary: Maybe I’ll have my picture up here someday.
[Evelyn grips her]
Evelyn: If you really desire it you can have your picture there, darling. I can help you. It takes focus and hard work, but if you succeed…your name will live forever.
…
Evelyn: I should never have agreed to this. Did he really expect you to just walk in and be able to dissect some random massive problem?
Mary: Not much to dissect, if you ask me.
Evelyn [startled]: Why? Why do you say that?
Mary: It was wrong.
Evelyn: What?
Mary: Well…for starters, he forgot the negative sign on the exponent. It went downhill from there. The problem was unsolvable. Maybe this school isn’t as great as you think it is.
…
Shankland: Mary, you knew that the problem was incorrect, why didn’t you say anything?
Mary: Frank says I’m not supposed to correct older people. Nobody likes a smart-ass.
…
Mary [to Pat the shrink]: Frank is a good person. He wanted me before I was smart.
…
Evelyn [to Frank’s lawyer in court]: Diane was not like regular people. She was extraordinary. And extraordinary people come with singular issues and needs. You have no idea of capability she possessed. One in a billion. And you would say: “Fine, let’s throw that away, so the boy who cuts our yard can make a sexual conquest.” Well maybe before you make that decision, you stand in my shoes. I had responsibilities, which are beyond the mother-daughter relationship. The greatest discoveries, which have proved life on this planet have come from minds rarer than radium. Without them, we’d still be crawling in mud.[/b]
So, does she have a point or not?
[b]Greg [Frank’s lawyer]: I’ll do whatever you want me to do. But, if we leave this up to that judge, Nickols…he’s a old school, Frank. Does he like your mother? No. Does he like her income? Does he like her health plan? Does he like her home? You better believe it. I’ve been in his courtroom. A hundred times. And if it’s a coin toss…Look at me. If it’s a coin toss that old boy is going to side with the money.
…
Evelyn: I’ve been thinking a lot about the word called “compromise”. On one hand, good challenging school…on the other…foster people. They can watch sitcoms with her. Take her to Olive Garden. Teach her to say “irregardless.” The only saving grace is, I suppose, that she is better off than she was. Goodbye, Frank.
…
Frank: Diane instructed me very clearly… that I was only to publish it postmortem.
Evelyn: She died six years ago.
Frank: It wasn’t her death she was talking about.
…
Mary: What is this book?
Frank [who was once a professor of philosophy]: “Discourse on Method.” Rene Descartes.
Mary: What’s it about?
Frank: Existence.
Mary: Existence?
Frank: Yup. “I think, therefore I am”.
Mary: Well, of course you are. That’s obvious…[/b]