Director: Alejandro Amenábar Screenplay: Alejandro Amenábar, Mateo Gil Cast: Rachel Weisz, Max Minghella, Oscar Isaac, Rupert Evans Time: 126min Age Restriction: 13VP

Genre:
Drama/Historical

Summary Review:
Agora will engage your intellect and educate you on ancient philosophy, all while taking you through an action-packed fight for a great city.

Synopsis:
Agora is set in Alexandria, Egypt in the 4th century A.D. The city’s people are a clashing mixture of pagans, who worship the ancient gods, Jews and Christians.

The pagan dignitaries at the Library of Alexandria become weary of the band of zealous Christians evangelising to “their” citizens and so they attack a group of Christians in the street. But the Gospel of Jesus Christ has spread like fire and there are more converts than they had expected.

The Christians soon overpower the pagans and eventually destroy their library.

Rachel Weisz plays Hypatia, the most renowned Egyptian philosopher of her time. She is a teacher at the Library and Agora focuses on the intellectual battle her and her students face in reconciling all that they know of science, astronomy and philosophy with the pagan religion of their ancestors and the new gospel of the Christians.

Hypatia has devoted her life to philosophy and it is in her nature to question theories and arrive at an understanding through logic and thought, while all around her chaos reigns as the Christians act out of passion for their faith, the Jews retaliate out of pride and revenge and the pagans fight blindly in fear of losing their tradition.

Agora has good casting, dialogue, settings, costumes and action sequences, but none of those factors are significantly better than other period pieces that we’ve seen.

What sets Agora apart, however, is the philosophical, religious and intellectual themes that are woven through the story at the heart of the fight for the city of Alexandria.

While it delivers on the prerequisites set for action, romance and character-crises, engaging your mind is Agora‘s greatest accomplishment and makes it unlike anything else you’re going to see at the cinema this year.

Agora will inspire many intense debates and discussions as people leave the cinema.