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Pi - The Movie
Pi is a 1998 movie (filmed in black and white) by Darren Aronofsky about a man chasing the mathematical patterns in life, natural processes, and in particular the stockmarket. The title refers to the irrational number Pi, defined as the ratio of circumference and diameter of a circle. The main character, Max, regularly visits his mentor, Sol, to exchange ideas while playing a game of Go. The game they play is shown in several scenes; another scene has Sol expounding on the limitless possibilities in Go.
Link: Dieter thinks the main character plays very sloppy for a genius. The DVD commentary tracks contain information on how Go became a part of the story, and part of the lives of the filmmakers. Darren Aronofsky, director: "...originally we were going to play Chess, but Eric Watson, the producer of the film, was like 'Hey, what about Go?' I didn't really know how the game worked but we decided to go and research it, and we hung out with the Brooklyn Go Club, and I brought the actors there. There was something really beautiful about the circles of the pieces and the grid, it was very mathematical and geometrical... "I started to meet lots of mathematicians who were fascinated by the game and decided to make it part of the film. The black and white didn't hurt either." Sean Gullette, lead actor ("Maximillian Cohen"): "Mark (Margolis, the actor for "Sol Robeson") and I went with Darren (Aronofsky) and Eric (Watson) to a number of Go-playing groups including the Go Club of Brooklyn, who gave us very interesting lessons in the game, and some of the background and history of this extraordinary, elegant game. "We built a Go set on the set and would play while sitting between scenes, and eventually everybody in the crew and a number of the cast members became recreational Go players and would have to interrupt their games to go work. "Go is so fundamentally different from Chess that one of the Go players we met described the Vietnam War as an encounter between the United States playing Chess and the Viet Cong playing Go; the approach is so different." -- Bignose ...and in their gratitude they donated the multi-$1,000 go goodies to the Club when they were done, right??? Note to self - contact film directors in the country to try and get go in their movies... --Stefan I think i read that Janice Kim helped with at least some of the game positions, which were based on a game by Shusaku. Ahrg, now i'm going to have to ransack my apartment to find that article (still looking). -- TakeNGive (moved here from Pi - SV)
Several years ago, a film appeared that featured a strong thematic subplot focused on Go. This movie, Pi, (on the web at I had mixed feelings about the film when I saw it in the theatre, and I'm probably due for another viewing; most of its references to Go have to do with infinity and the inherent unknowability of the universe. The major actors spent some time in the Brooklyn Go Club, learning how to play in order to accurately represent it onscreen. Overall, I felt that the movie -- while delving into some very intriguing and complex issues -- left me with an unsettled feeling. The themes that came and went -- including Go -- seemed thin and insubstantial. They seemed to point vaguely toward the main character's quests, but ultimately didn't provide any assistance for him. I, on the other hand, have found Go to be an immensely enlightening game (in fact, 'game' seems like an inappropriate word). I shall babble on further in PhilosophyOfGo. -- Scartol I've just watched the film again, and radically revised my opinion of it. I saw a hundred things I missed the first time through. Maybe I should just refrain from commenting on anything worth commenting on until after the second viewing. Nonetheless, a few thoughts stand out. The main one being my profound impression that this movie is, through and through, a tragedy. On first viewing, I thought Max (the main character) was happy at the end of the film, free from the prison of numbers. But now I feel that he's flipped. Instead of finding pure order, he has embraced pure chaos. Neither of which holds the key to true happiness. True, he'll never again be tormented with the agony of the 216 digit number; but he'll also never enjoy the beauty of the numbers behind the spiral. As I wrote in PhilosophyOfGo, it seems that the key to success in Go (and Zen, and Max's life) is finding the balance between chaos and order. The Zen masters speak of the sound of one hand, the man biting the cliff who cannot speak and cannot remain silent. Ying and yang, chaos and order. Neither one nor the other. -- Scartol This is a copy of the living page "Pi - The Movie" at Sensei's Library. (C) the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0. |