RUTHERFORD ON FILM
'Proof': Excruciating Drama as Paltrow Once Again Chases an Oscar Nomination
By Tony RutherfordHuntington News Network Writer
Huntington, WV (HNN) --- Gorgeous Gwyneth Paltrow has dabbled with eye candy roles ("Shallow Hal," "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow"), but this tall delicate beauty surprised the film community in 1998 with an Oscar win for "Shakespeare in Love."
Chalk up another nomination for Paltrow as the desperately depressed, self esteem challenged Catherine, who has taken care of her psychotic mathematician father (Anthony Hopkins) in a Chicago cottage near the university where her dad achieved iconic status. Upon her dad's demise, Catherine experiences more than grief for her father. Sister Claire (Hope Davis) is determined to sell the house and move her disturbed sister to NYC. Hal (Jake Gyllenhaal, who's a little too attractive for a math nerd), her dad's ex-student, searches his papers for a last sign of brilliance while nursing a crush on Catherine that he hid out of respect for her dad.
From the first frames of "Proof," Paltrow's close-ups convey her sunken, blankly staring eyes, a hunched posture, and a voice of meek resonance. It's as if she can barely find the energy to sit upward. She nervously flings her locks, but continually looks downward and has a haltingly uncertainty as she moves from place to place.
Instantly, viewers feel her pain as well as glimpse her troubled mind.
As if to sneak an absurdity into the mix, Hal discovers a brilliantly solved math perplexity in one of the hundreds of notebooks filled with her dad's jumbled writings. Could he have regained his rationality prior to his death or could quiet Catherine be an emerging math researching? And, if so, how much of her family's creative insanity flows through her veins?
Hope Davis plays a dominating, organizational obsessed sister who arrives from the Big Apple determined to sell the house and lure Catherine east where institutionalization waits. Davis' repeated patronizing belittlement strips Paltrow of any sense of self, even when her alleged 'imagined' friend proves to be more than an invisible yearning, Davis curtly continues to waylay any of her sister's accomplishments.
Adapted from a Tony Award winning Broadway play, the script, directed by John Madden, retains exceedingly intense character drama despite adding a little extra scenery to what was a one room set. The reasonably appropriate choices include a shopping for a funeral dress sequence, as well as scenes in the church, on campus, and those at an airport. These prevent a too stagy appearance and permit excruciating dramatic conflict.