Fermat’s Room – a mathematical thriller
“The more you study logic, the more you value coincidence” – from Fermat’s Room.
Four mathematicians are give pseudonyms Galois, Hilbert, Pascal and Oliva and are called to an unknown place for reasons unknown after they all manage to solve a not-so-mathematical puzzle by a man who calls himself Fermat.
A group of people locked up in a room…I love such settings. The fact the people trapped in the room this time are a bunch of mathematicians only generated more interest.
I came to know of the movie after reading Krishna’s post on Spanish film festival in Hyderabad. It sounded interesting to say the least.
The movie is about four mathematicians who are invited by a man called Fermat to a place for a mathematical meeting. The place is a well furnished room equipped with all the facilities and with lots of books on mathematics, not to forget the piano 
They are send puzzles on a PDA which they are to solve before the allotted time runs out. If they fail to do so the walls of the room start shrinking. So if they fail to solve puzzles they would all die in the shriking room. They now need to solve the puzzles on the PDA as fast as they can and at the same time solve the bigger puzzle about who is Fermat and why does he want to kill them?
Loved the plot and the way the thriller has been executed. The conversation among the mathematicians is well-written.
Fermat's room
To start with, the choices of the names that Fermat decides to give these players in the game is in itself rather interesting. I was amused how the name Hilbert went to the eldest of them all, Oliva to the girl, and Galois to the youngest of them. An impulsive young genius. It fits perfectly. But the perfect fitting names are no coincidence as I realized later. I would not want to reveal more about the plot so moving on with the choice of names ‘Fermat’ again was a masterstroke. Fermat is one of the most enigmatic characters in the history of mathematics. His notebooks littered with various results whose proofs he could fit into the small margins (an oft repeated joke among the mathematicians) have been a major source of inspiration and research in mathematics. So it is not a surprise that ‘Fermat’ is the name chosen for the mathematician who weaves the entire puzzle.
The starting point of the film is the famous Goldbach’s conjecture (”Every even number can be written as a sum of two primes“).
There are many such magnetic problems in mathematics that have been unsolved for years now. Riemann Hypothesis being the most famous.
A famous mathematician (G.H.Hardy) once wrote that whenever he took a boat trip he left back a letter stating that he had successfully solved the Riemann Hypothesis. I always thought it was to ensure that if he dies during the journey his name would go down in history of mathematics as the one who probably had a solution of the famous problem however I am told that the real reason was that he viewed it as a form of life insurance, rather than a chance at fame. If he wrote that he had proved the Riemann hypothesis, God, with whom he waged a very personal war, would not allow him to die in such glory and so he would live!
Fermat’s last theorem is another very famous problem which after years of work by many people was finally solved by Andrew Wiles and is also the reason for the joke I mentioned above. On what has come to known as Fermat’s last theorem, Fermat wrote in his notebook ‘I have a truly marvellous proof of this proposition which this margin is too narrow to contain’
This one statement left people wondering (and debating) for year as to whether he really had a correct proof or not!
Enough digression. Coming back to the famous Goldbach’s conjecture. It is perhaps the easiest of all these famous unsolved problems in formulation. A layman can understand it. Pehaps that’s the reason why it was chosen for the movie. There have been many futile attempts to prove it and it still remains one of those problems that can become an obsession. That’s what is shown in the movie. The obsession to solve the problem, the euphoria of having done so, the envy….okay I’ll stop before I divulge too much.
Other than being a gripping thriller what I liked about the film is that it presents mathematicians as normal people with normal fears of death and unknown and not like geniuses constantly haunted by their imperfections, their obsessions and other demons. They fall in love, they betray, they are jealous. Alright some of them are weird too! but my point is that not every mathematician is schizophrenic and not every scientist has a crazy Einstein hair-do!
Also loved the way film pokes fun at mathematicians. The dialogues where Pascal and galois are working to find a way to stop the room from shrinking.
Pascal: “I know what you want to do”
Galois: “Will it work?”
Pascal: “There is just one way to find out”
Galois: “Yeah” and continues scribbling on the blackboard.
Pascal: “The only way to find out is by doing it!”
Galois: “Oh right”
Reminds me of this joke/story a friend once told me – In a mathematical conversation, someone suggested to Grothendieck that they should consider a particular prime number.
“You mean an actual number?” Grothendieck asked.
Other person – “yes, an actual prime number.”
Grothendieck – “All right, take 57.”
And thus was born the Grothendieck prime!
All those doubting the story, note here Mumford’s observation: ‘But Grothendieck must have known that 57 is not prime, right? Absolutely not. He doesn’t think concretely’!
Coming back to the movie even though the motive for the entire setup made perfect sense – one of the most important things for a thriller to work – I was a tad bit disappointed at the end but that shouldn’t keep anyone from watching the film. It’s a very well made film. Would not want to reveal anymore but let me just say that the very last scene on the boat is brilliant!
Do watch it if you get chance.
* 57 is NOT a prime.
** The mathematics jokes/stories are the ones I heard from my friends and professors over the years.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Wow, mathematical thriller, that’s enough. I so want to see this. :D
is the DVD out Neeraja ?
The premise of the movie was good, but I think the fact that I already knew many of the puzzles kind of made it less interesting than it could have been. Overall worth a watch, and is not a minute too long.
Defnitely worth a watch. a tad too simple i say
Excellent ,a movie on mathematics ….is it releasing in India ? ,and there were plans about making a biopic on Ramanujam ,does anyone have any idea about that ?
Hi Neeraja,
Thanks for introducing us to this “mathematical thriller”. Is the DVD available in India?
Very Good Post !!! Will watch the movie for sure …
Havn’t yet seen this one…
But right now I’m watching a movie called The Oxford Murders…this also uses mathematical symbolism ti solve a mystery…The “Bormat’s Last Theorem” in the movie is a reference to Fermat’s Last Theorem…
Got to watch this one…tx for the recco Neeraja…
the plot (as revealed by you) seems to bear an uncanny similarity with that of the 1998 Vincenzo Natali movie CUBE where six strangers are locked in a sphere which is constantly shrinking and they have to find a way out. The movie not only employs physics and mathematics principles in its storyline but also entwines the inter-relationship and dependence of people from different walks from life sharing a crisis together.
Fermat’s last theorem and the story of the mathematician who finally solved it (He solved it twice. The first proof was rejected after a considerable delay.) can be made into a riveting movie. I’ve always fiddled with the idea of writing a script on the same. The story of how it got solved in the end could be made into a staggering film.
I’m also eagerly waiting for Indian Clerk. I guess that’d be the name of the movie on Ramanujam.
i liked the movie a lot…but the only problem was with the puzzles..i mean most of them were commom and famous puzzles which i am sure most of us have heard and solved over the years …nevertheless a good thriller ….
Can we get it on the DVD?
I saw oxford murders and it wasnt so interesting.but this one is much better plot.would like to see it
Oxford Mudders is considered an avg thriller & hasn’t been favored by most critics…this one promises to be better…
but I kinda liked Oxford Murders also(probably because of Leonor Watling…:P)…& John Hurt was excellent…
@Anand
Yeah the puzzles were mostly non-mathematical and commonplace but I guess opting for hardcore mathematical stuff would have limited the movie to a very small audience.
@Subhasish
Have you watched Fermat’s last tango?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0278443/
@Anubhav
Thanks! Will try n catch ‘Cube’ some time.
Watched Oxford Murders recently. Didn’t like it.
@Vineet
Have been hearing about the Ramanujan biopic for a while now. No idea who is making it and when. Just hope they don’t spoil it by roping in a star!
Anubhav,
i didnt like cube that much …we are not shown how and why these guys end up in the cube….it mostly tries to explore inter human behaviour but somehow fails to explore it completely…and there is where Fermat’s room scores more , coz it has some logical explaination for things happening …..
I watched Oxford Murders recently. Leonor Watling is indeed droolworthy.
Will watch Fermat’s Room jab mauka milega.
@Kenny
You liked Oxford murders?
an interesting book on fermat’s last theorem by simone singh is pretty good..full of interesting anecdotes…proving a hypothesis helps a mathematician earn immortality…so while fermat’s theorem is not so much interesting result..but again the fact we struggled with proof for so long makes it famous..Fermat did much more interesting maths than this..
compare it with geniuses like Gauss n Ramanujan who produced hypotheses n result in a frenzy..Ramanujan’s story is truly heroic..he had simply a book of formulas n he independently produced all proofs of past 200 years..more so he was said to produce almost 10-15 hypothesis each day..that he said were inspired by a certain goddess.
Interesting points…further G.H. Hardy who catapulted his work to cambridge n world was reportedly a gay..
..his lost diaries with last year of work..are now playing a seminal role in string theory in grand unification theoey..
.. i really wish some indian director laps up this opportunity to make a movie on him..if there is a truly heroic,unconventional n genius mathematician ..then it is ramanujan..
if u read almost all popular mathematics book by good mathematicians….they speak so fondly and mythically of ramanujan..he is almost on same pedestal as gauss if not less..
an interesting psycho-mathematical movie pie..by darren arnofsky..
an interesting movie also could be made on life of Blaise pascal..who after having been such a brilliant mathematician n physicist left all to become a monk..
I’m not sure how I feel about it. It was pretty much by the numbers (how’s that for a pun) for most of its running length, but I really liked the concept behind the solution to the mystery.
Nice one, though there are too many typing errors. Should have been avoided. I’m going to watch this one of these days.
Read and commented upon :P
Also not many seemed to have appreciated the stories !
@Appy
LOL! you can proof-read my posts from now on :D
May be the stories about mathematicians are more popular than we thought! :P
Do watch it.
@Anupam
The beauty of Fermat’s theorem is that it’s formulation is so simple that even a school kid can understand it. It took years to prove what appeared like an easy problem at first look.
@neeraja..
true..its a very simple formulation..and its proof required ellipses theory by galois and others which developed much later ..an interesting trivia is since wiles required reams of paper and advanced maths for his proof..fermat might as well have been bluffing or had an inaccurate proof…it was not uncommon in these days..but if u consider its utility as a result..i am afraid it does not lead to much..having said that it must be said that G.H. hardy himself said that “if mathematicians themselves always thought to develop results of utility then probably they won’t do mathematics at all’..consider number theory the “queen of mathematics ” ..after a certain point it became too abstract..but in late twentieth entury and in twenty first century it has struck with a vengeance..with applications in online security,transactions, encryptation etc..but gauss who discovered many of these theorems never knew what use they wd be put to..
but consider this yet unproved goldbach’s conjecture, another of hilbert’s 23 problems ..”Every even integer greater than 2 can be written as the sum of two primes”..it is closely related to riemann hypothesis and has lots of implications for mathematics prime number theorem , partitioning and online security..and is one of candidates for millenium prize for mathematics..
it looks like u are a mathematician with a penchant for elegance n beauty..i m a doctor who loves the applications (gaussian distribution is a key feature of medical variables in research)..n ,mysteries of math n hv a penchant 4 reading popular science in particular probability, statistics n some passing interests in evolution and physics..so i like subjects which are perhaps more grounded n interesting to me..though i can claim only a partial understanding..but its more fun..
i would recommend john derbyshire’s bok on riemann hypothesis which i thoroughly enjoyed..full of interesting anecdotes..
After reading this article, i came to know about this movie. And i watched it few days back.
It is good movie. but not very good. i knew the puzzle, and those were not that great for those mathematicians.
The character, who planned all this, was supposed to be a genius, but he didn’t plan all this in a better way, there were many things which cud wrong, and those went wrong too.
I didn’t like the movie, my expectations were high. I love mathematics, and i love mystery movies a lot, i love to find loopholes in mystery movies.
This review was more entertaining than the movie.
Got to see this one!