Shakuntala Devi
In the film, as the world continues to get mesmerized by the genius of India’s mathematical prodigy Shakuntala Devi, one thing that is constant throughout is the “How?”. Every show she does invariably ends with someone gaping in awe of what she just did by asking the question “How do you do it? How?”.
And yet, neither Anu Menon, the director nor Nayanika Mahtani, the scriptwriter make an effort to establish that ‘how’ to us. Which actually works remarkably well for this biopic of Shakuntala Devi because we understand the film is not about the demystification of the talent behind “The human computer” Shakuntala Devi, but this biopic is rather about the demystification of Shakuntala Devi, the woman. And that this film is told through the eyes of Anu, the daughter, makes it an even more of a convincing biopic, narratively speaking.
With the script jumping back & forth across years and decades, the director flashes the year numbers on screen every time the script jumps to a different year, making us, the viewers calculate things in our minds. After all, what is a Shakuntala Devi biopic if it’s not about numbers? It’s brilliant because this sets the narrative pace of the movie very well by throwing us moments from Shakuntala Devi’s life. The sum of parts from the relationship between Shakuntala Devi and Anu that we get to see…
