RADIOACTIVE
Unstable elements…
With her debut feature Persepolis (2008), Marjane Satrapi adapted her comic-strip autobiography into a frequently inspired portrait of her teen-rebel years. Twelve years on, Satrapi’s riff on Lauren Redniss’ illustrated Marie Curie biography is another portrait of a convention-busting outsider, albeit one intermittently hobbled by genre cliché.
The controlling element is Rosamund Pike; her commanding presence humanises the tenacious Curie (née Maria Skłodowska) without softening her combative edges. Despite Jack Thorne’s sometimes on-the-nose script, Radioactive is crystal-clear on Curie’s battles in male-led science institutions. Her marriage to fellow scientist Pierre Curie (Sam Riley) adds romantic chemistry to the setup. But Satrapi’s main focus becomes Curie’s discoveries of polonium and radium.
Although Satrapi clutters the film’s lab space with biographical montages, she fares better with bold flashes forward to the effects of Curie’s discoveries. Chemotherapy, Hiroshima, Chernobyl and even radioactive toothpaste enter a wide-ranging
mix. Satrapi doesn’t simplify Curie’s findings, and DoP Anthony Dod Mantle’s retro-modern images and Evgueni and Sacha Galperine’s score blur past/ present divides.
If the plotting plods with the introduction of Curie’s daughter (Anya Taylor-Joy), compensations for Satrapi’s broad biographical sweep aren’t lacking. With Curie neither damned nor deified, Radioactive stands as a flawed but searching anatomisation of a complex’s woman’s work: even its contradictions come laced with intelligence. Kevin Harley
THE VERDICT
Biopic stodge aside, Satrapi’s Curie portrait doesn’t lack ideas. Pike is bristlingly brilliant.