Creation

Charles Darwin did not write The Origin of Species in a vacuum. He first hit on his idea of evolutionary theory more than 20 years before he published the book that changed science forever. The delay had as much to do with reconciling his ideas with faith—his wife remained devout, while Darwin could no longer justify anything said to be “God’s plan”—as it did with fleshing out his ideas more fully. Creation (a funny name for a movie about the father of evolution) fills in those gaps in the scientist’s fossil record, charting Darwin (Paul Bettany) through the best and worst years of his life, which just so happened to coincide. A bit stuffy and not as singularly focused as it should be, Creation is competent and effective, but not supremely engaging. Bettany is up to his usual standards, but his real-life wife, Jennifer Connelly, steals his thunder as Darwin’s long-suffering bride.