
Gwyneth Paltrow who won an Oscar for her performance in director John Madden's SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE teams up again with Madden in PROOF a poignant drama based on David Auburn's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Paltrow lights up the screen as Catherine a young woman who has given up a seemingly bright future in order to take care of her ailing father Robert (Anthony Hopkins) a formerly brilliant mathematician who went crazy After he dies Catherine's closed-off world is invaded by Hal (Jake Gyllenhaal) a young mathematician who worshipped Robert & Claire (Hope Davis) her successful sister who fears that Catherine is too much like their father a talented supremely intelligent person with severe mental problems During the last years of his life Robert filled 103 notebooks with his writings but one of them written during a brief period of lucidity could turn the math world on its head while also threatening Catherine's already wavering sanity Auburn co-wrote the screenplay with Rebecca Miller (PERSONAL VELOCITY THE BALLAD OF JACK & ROSE) taking it off the stage setting it in & around Chicago & breathing new life into the story along with Stephen Warbeck's compelling score & plenty of outstanding acting particularly by the glowing Paltrow & the earnest Gyllenhaal