Making films is not an easy business. That is a given. But it takes a lot more to be as dedicated as Matt Brown, who put in 10 years of his life in making a film based on the life of Srinivasa Ramanujan, the genius mathematician from Chennai. Brown was one film old — he had directed a small comedy Ropewalk in 2000 — when he was handed a copy of Robert Kanigel’s biography The Man Who Knew Infinity: A Life of the Genius Ramanujan . At that time Brown was taking care of a friend undergoing cancer treatment, and started reading the book in the hospital. “I connected with the themes of isolation,” said Brown while promoting his film, based on Kanigel’s book, at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Aseem Chhabra “It directly spoke to me at that time,” Brown said about Kanigel’s book. “And I started writing the script in the oncology ward.” But, despite all his good intentions, Brown found it impossible to raise finances for the film. “At one point I got so fed up that I said I am done,” he said, adding that the theme of the film was a hard sell. “It is about an Indian mathematician at the turn of the century with no major love interest. I was asked at one point to show a love affair between him and a white nurse, and the film would have been financed.”
While he did not reveal names, a few Indian actors were considered for the project, but that was not enough to bring Hollywood money for the film. Then, two years back, Brown considered sharing the script with Dev Patel. Patel, the star of Slumdog Millionaire, faced a few years of struggle too; despite the film winning multiple Oscars, he was only offered the roles of cab drivers and terrorists. But Patel’s luck changed with the success of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel . And by the time he was approached by Brown, Patel was in his early 20s, relatively close to the age of Ramanujan, who was 27 when he went to Trinity College in Cambridge University to study with G.H. Hardy. With Patel’s name attached, there was sudden interest in the film. People were willing to fund it.
London-born Patel, who actually bears no resemblance to Ramanujan, works really hard to tone down his British accent in The Man Who Knew Infinity , with some level of success. But at times it seems as though he is trying too hard to transform himself into a Tamil Brahmin. The film actually belongs to Jeremy Irons, who is brilliant in the role of Hardy, a socially awkward man who believed in Ramanujan. Part of the film is set in Tamil Nadu, but it was a challenge for Brown to find authentic streets of Brahmin houses in today’s Chennai. So the film crew travelled seven hours by road to find more appropriate locations in Coimbatore. The other challenge was dealing with modern signs of life in Chennai. “I can’t say it was easy to shoot with fireworks going on in Chennai every two seconds,” Brown said. “Saturday nights are wedding nights in Chennai. It was incredible.”
(Aseem Chhabra is a freelance writer.)
