Srinivasa
Ramanujan Iyengar does all he can to be admitted to Cambridge University during
WWI, despite growing up poor in Madras, India. Having successfully enrolled in
the university, he studies nothing but mathematics, eventually becoming a
pioneer in mathematical theories with the guidance of his professor, G.H.
Hardy.
Written and
directed by Matthew Brown, The Man Who Knew Infinity is the true story of
friendship that forever changed mathematics. In 1913, Srinivasa Ramanujan (Dev
Patel), a self-taught Indian mathematics genius, traveled to Trinity College,
Cambridge, where over the course of five years, forged a bond with his mentor,
the brilliant and eccentric professor, G.H. Hardy (Jeremy Irons), and fought
against prejudice to reveal his mathematic genius to the world. The film also
stars Devika Bhise, Stephen Fry and Toby Jones. This is Ramanujan's story as
seen through Hardy's eyes.
Knuckling
down to a considerably more rigorous intellectual challenge than he faced in
Slumdog Millionaire, Patel plays the Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan,
whose research in the field of number theory took English academe by storm
around the time of the First World War.
Growing up
poor in Madras, India, Srinivasa Ramanujan Iyengar earns admittance to
Cambridge University during WWI, where he becomes a pioneer in mathematical
theories with the guidance of his professor, G.H. Hardy.
Rather, the friction between Hardy and Ramanujan has to do with methodology. Hardy insists that his new colleague must prove his theories through traditional means; Ramanujan disagrees. At stake is nothing less than the future, and the meaning, of mathematics.