First of all, this film focuses on the story of a seven-year-old girl with a talent for mathematics. Should we cultivate her talent from an early age and train her to become a mathematician, or let nature take its course and give her a happy childhood? However, there is more than one talented girl in the film, and Diane, the little girl's mother, is one of them, but Diane has committed suicide and has never appeared again. She can only be restored through the description of the girl's uncle and grandmother.
As talented girls, Mary and Diane have different life paths. Diane's mother Evelyn was obsessed with math research, but she gave up her math career because she got married and had children. Coupled with her unhappy marriage, she is unwilling. At this time, her daughter Diane inherited her mathematical talent, so her heart rekindled hope and pinned it on her daughter. Since she was a child, she has shaped her daughter into a mathematical genius and carefully planned and trained her, so that Diane never went to high school, never. Mary has the same mathematical talent as her mother, but she is much luckier. Although she lost her mother when she was very young, she never met her father. Fortunately, her mother entrusted her to a trustworthy uncle before her death, and her life changed a lot. Like Diane, her uncle Frank received a harsh education from childhood and made some achievements when he grew up. She became a professor in a famous university, but fortunately, Frank was not a genius, so he didn't receive special education like his sister Diane. There would be no abnormal life. After his sister died, he began to reflect on the reasons for all this. In order to prevent Mary from repeating the same mistakes, Frank quit his job and took Mary to a seaside town to become a ship repairman, in order to let Mary live a real childhood. At this time, Mary's mathematical talent was displayed, and her unwilling grandmother found them and wanted to take Mary away and make her as good as her mother, which was inspired by the contradiction in the story.
So, what caused the tragedy?
First of all, in the film, my grandmother imposed her ideals on her children because she was dissatisfied with life, which reminded me of another movie I saw, Confessions. In the film, the hero and the little boy's mother did exactly the same thing as her grandmother. Her research career was influenced by marriage and family, so she pinned her ideals on her children in an attempt to realize her ultimate dream with them. Once the reality deviates from the ideal, she can't bear it, even blaming the child, and finally the little boy.