RADIOACTIVE

UK/France, 2019, 109 minutes, Colour.

Rosamund Pike, Sam Riley, Simon Russell Beale, Aneurin Barnard,  Anya Taylor-Joy, Sian Brooke.

Directed by Marjane Satrapi.

It can be noted that the film is not solely a biography/portrait of Marie Curie. It is, sometimes, a visual portrait, fantasy sequences and dreams, suggestions of Madame Curie’s subconscious, the contrast between her very stern manner and underlying deep emotions. This style may reflect the strong Iranian background and sensibilities of the director, Marjane Satrapi.

Rather, the film’s title indicates that it is in fact, something of a biography/portrait of radioactivity itself. Throughout the film (rather interrupting the dramatic impact of Madame Curie’s life, love for her husband and their working together, his untimely death in a street accident), there are sequences which illustrate the consequences of radioactivity – flash-forwards, interrupting the drama, including the dropping of the atomic bomb, visually vivid and shocking, on Hiroshima 1945, the observing of nuclear tests in the Nevada desert in 1961, the meltdown at Chernobyl in 1986 – but also anticipation of practical applications of radiotherapy in the 1950s.

The film is also a portrait inviting speculation about the workings of the scientific mind. Perhaps it is the inner Intuition, theories, hypotheses, lateral thinking, offering definition, clarity. There is always the reliance on laboratory verification, applications of reasoning and logic. Which, of course, is not to say that scientists are not emotional. It is that their judgements and decisions are objective, that their personal investment in science is objective.

And that is how Rosamund Pike’s interpretation of Marie Curie comes across. Her mind is working all the time. She wants to investigate but also to get things done. Which, in her case, led to the pioneering work in discoveries of radium and polonium (named after her native Poland, dear to her), that the radium did not react as anticipated, leading to important applications, the discovery of x-rays and processes of radiotherapy, especially for cancer.

In the film, she comes across as quite impersonal, arrogant, to say the least – which academics and authorities declared her to be. She has no patience in interviews, demands to be accepted, for instance as first female professor in a university in France, on her own merits. She was prevented in accompanying her husband, Pierre, to Stockholm for the awarding of the Nobel Prize in 1903 because she had just given birth. This reinforced her self-assertion, scenes of dismissive attitude by male academics and government officials.

Her relationship with Pierre Curie started off rather frostily, he a much more warm personality than she. The film shows a mellowing in her relationship with her husband – but, on the whole, not as much as one might expect or hope for. It is the same in her relationship with her daughters. An amusing sequence illustrates this – her daughter, Irene, later to be a Nobel prizewinner herself, brings her fiance for her mother’s approval. Mother is interested solely in the young man’s PhD studies, quickly remarking that they can take the relationship for granted and then moving on to the scientific interrogation.

It is interesting to note that the first film about Madame Curie was made within 10 years of her death in 1934. It starred the popular screen pair of the time, Greer Garson and Walton Pidgeon as the couple. It focused on her work, the publicly edifying aspects of her character. This version does not shun the scandal of her relationship, after her husband’s tragic death, with one of her associates, he prepared to leave his wife. The media made ugly play of the scandal. The public were rabble-roused in demonstrations against her. She handles the situation in Thinking fashion, breaking it off.

But, her daughter, Irene (Anya Taylor-Joy) offers her an opportunity to move towards some kind of personal integration. Marie Curie resisted entering hospitals because, as in flashbacks, it was in the hospital when as a young girl that she had to say goodbye to her loving mother. In the context of World War I, Irene shows her mother some amputee soldiers – indicating that the use of x-rays would have diagnosed injuries more accurately and avoided the drastic surgery. Marie Curie challenges the authorities for funding – threatening to go to the media to highlight the government meanness. But, being on the battlefield focuses her attention on the real, the here and now, challenging her Feeling decisions about how to treat the wounded.

The range of flashforwards to Hiroshima, the Nevada desert, Chernobyl, are a significant part of the screenplay even if, at times, they seem dramatic intrusions into the portrait of Marie Curie. The Curies’ discoveries, and she was awarded two Nobel prizes, had world-changing consequences. But, they were for good and for ill.

In his speech at the Nobel prize awards in 2003, Pierre Curie reminded his audience that Alfred Nobel invented dynamite and produced weapons and armaments (consequently persuading Nobel to establish the awards with his fortune). There were significant positive consequences but, he warned, there were dangerous consequences to their work in radioactivity.

And so, Radioactive highlights both, Marie Curie herself, a claim for her work but suffering the effects of radiation until her death in 1934. The film offers a strong portrait of a pioneer woman scientist.

1. The title the focus? Biography/portrait of Marie Curie? The history of radioactivity, a sketch portrait?
2. Audience knowledge of Madame Curie, her Polish origins, studying in Paris, her research, demanding personality, collaborating with Pierre Curie, their discoveries, radium, polonium, radioactivity? The Nobel Prize? Her further research, professorship at the University, Nobel Prize for chemistry? Her personal life, the relationship with Paul and the scandal of the time? World War I, x-rays, radio therapy? Her daughter (and her winning the Nobel prize)?
3. Recreation of Paris, the 1890s, costumes and decor, the streets, homes, laboratories, equipment? The world of academia and board meetings? Stockholm, the Nobel Prize? Paris and the transition from the 1890s into the 20^th century, transport, cars, typewriters, laboratories and equipment? The World War I sequences, the battlefields, bleak, the snow? The musical score?
4. The structure of the screenplay: biographical details, the sudden interruptions of the flash-forwards? The contexts? In the work of the Curies? Healing therapy in the 1950s? Radioactivity, the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima, the tests in the Nevada desert in 1961, Chernobyl, 1986? The visualising of these episodes? The placement within the structure of the film? The dramatic effect – or lessening it?
5. Rosamund Pike as Marie Curie? Age and ageing? The Polish background, the flashbacks to her childhood, joy with her sister, with her mother, her mother’s illness, the hospital, her dying and the farewell? The repercussions for Marie over the years? Unwilling to face hospitals or go into them? Her single-mindedness, continued working, her experiments, her applications to the boards and her rejection, the academic men looking down on her as a woman, scientist? The chance encounter with Pierre Curie, the second meeting, their reading each other’s work, discussions, collaboration, love, marriage, the children? His taking her to the club, the dancer, the material, the patterns of movement – scientific patterns? In this image recurring in Marie’s imagination and dreams?
6. The Curies working together, the experiments, the testing, verification, radium, not acting predictably, its qualities, the further elements, polonium? The presentation of their work? The Nobel Prize, Pierre insisting on his wife’s name being included? His going to Stockholm for the award, and Marie not being able to go, giving birth, remaining at home? The consequences, her reactions, as a woman excluded, her demands on her husband? His continued love and support?
7. Pierre, on the street, shop, walking into the carriage, his death? Her grief? His later appearing to her? The moment when she wanted a seance to see him again? The surreal sequences in the latter part of the film, her imagination, dreams?
8. Marie and her continued work, the Nobel Prize? The issue of the position at the University, her being interviewed, wanting the position on her own merits, not the connection with her husband? Her being given the position, seeing her in class, the students, her expositions?
9. Paul and his wife, friends and collaborators, Paul and the attraction to Marie, the relationship, the children seeing them in the room? The media, scandal? Public outcries outside the house? Her reputation? The strong stances, the emotional toll, breaking off the relationship?
10. World War I, Irene and her working as a nurse, bringing her fiance for the interview, Marie taking Love Is accepted and more interested in the interview about his PhD work?
11. Irene showing her mother the amputees, her mother’s reluctance to go near the hospital? Irene explaining that x-rays would have given the truth about injuries and prevented amputation surgery? Marie going to the board, the authorities turning out the grants for x-rays on the battlefield? The threat to go to the media?
12. The impact of the work in World War I, the healing power of her work, more emotional demands on her?
13. The subsequent history, international meetings, her reputation, her being infected by the radioactivity, her death in 1934? Her continued reputation?