To enjoy many good stories, you have to suspend disbelief. I enjoyed I Origins but would like to address some problems in execution rather than in the overall theme.
The overall suspense of finding the answer to the question of life and reincarnation overwhelmingly understated the agnostic, anti-theist, or atheist cases. This can be forgiven given that romance is much harder to portray with dead-sober rationals like these.
The filmmaker wisely chose to end the story with affirmation of the main character's existential beliefs without hard proof. This is essential to films like these. If they completely resolved the philosophical dilemma, the film would have been panned.
The most glaring error lies with the testing method he used on the young Indian girl with the same eyes as his ex-girlfriend. It was utterly unscientific from the start. Others have pointed out small errors in the plot and science of the film but this one is almost unforgivable. When he asks her to choose one out of three pictures, he relays if it is correct or incorrect to his wife which is obvious psychological manipulation of the girl. This would invalidate the test results. At the end, the girl even asks if she did poorly on the test clearly revealing the case. I can accept the better than 33% test results but the error in testing methodology left a sour taste in my mouth.
In hindsight, I realize it was done to allow quick analysis of the results thereby moving the story forward without extra scenes or dialogue. I have yet to determine whether or not it is acceptable. I will let it go. It's a movie, not a scientific treatise. I Origins is worth a watch.
The overall suspense of finding the answer to the question of life and reincarnation overwhelmingly understated the agnostic, anti-theist, or atheist cases. This can be forgiven given that romance is much harder to portray with dead-sober rationals like these.
The filmmaker wisely chose to end the story with affirmation of the main character's existential beliefs without hard proof. This is essential to films like these. If they completely resolved the philosophical dilemma, the film would have been panned.
The most glaring error lies with the testing method he used on the young Indian girl with the same eyes as his ex-girlfriend. It was utterly unscientific from the start. Others have pointed out small errors in the plot and science of the film but this one is almost unforgivable. When he asks her to choose one out of three pictures, he relays if it is correct or incorrect to his wife which is obvious psychological manipulation of the girl. This would invalidate the test results. At the end, the girl even asks if she did poorly on the test clearly revealing the case. I can accept the better than 33% test results but the error in testing methodology left a sour taste in my mouth.
In hindsight, I realize it was done to allow quick analysis of the results thereby moving the story forward without extra scenes or dialogue. I have yet to determine whether or not it is acceptable. I will let it go. It's a movie, not a scientific treatise. I Origins is worth a watch.