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Gifted(2017)
Fox Searchlight Pictures- PG-13
- 1h 41m
Apr 7, 2017 | Limited
Frank, a single man raising his child prodigy niece Mary, is drawn into a custody battle with his mother.
Releases
Original Release | Apr 7, 2017
Box Office
Results
$446,380
$24,801,212
$18,268,042
$43,069,254
Director & Top Cast
Technical Specifications
Sound Mix: Dolby Digital
Aspect Ratio: 2.39 : 1
Other Details
Country of Origin: United States
Summaries
Plot Summary
- In the morning of her first day at school, Mary (Mckenna Grace) is in a foul mood because she doesn't want to go. She wants Frank (Chris Evans) to continue homeschooling her, but he says he's taught her everything he knows, and she needs the experience. As soon as he sees the reluctant, sulking Mary off to school, he's confronted by Roberta (Octavia Spencer), who's his landlady and friend, and cares deeply for Mary. She tells him to get in his car and bring Mary back before it's too late, afraid that she will be taken away once everyone realizes she's a child prodigy. Frank tries to calm her down, saying Mary needs friends and social skills. Roberta isn't convinced, but there's nothing she can do, so she lets go.At school, Mary is shown bored out of her mind as Bonnie (Jenny Slate), her teacher, goes over first-grade math problems with the rest of the class. Mary eventually speaks up, making it known that the lack of challenge is beyond her ability to bear. Bonnie warns her for speaking out of turn and starts asking her increasingly difficult arithmetic problems to make a point. To her surprise, Mary answers them all. After recess, the Principal requests a walk-in observation of Bonnie's class. As soon as she introduces herself to the children, Mary demands to know if she's "the boss", and upon confirmation, demands that she call Frank right away and tell him to get her out of there. When Frank comes to pick Mary up, Bonnie catches up to him on the front yard and tells him she thinks Mary might be a gifted child. Frank chalks it off to some simple algorithm he's taught her and walks away before Bonnie can discuss the matter with him any further.Bonnie then does her own research and finds out that Mary's mom Diane was a Math genius, also, working on one of the Millennium Prize problems when she apparently took her own life and was survived by her brother Frank. She then confronts Frank at the bar she knows he hangs out on Friday nights and learns the back story. Diane, her sister, appeared at her doorstep out of the blue one night with Mary, who was just a baby at the time. She said she needed to talk to him but Frank, already late for a date, told her they'd talk when he got back. When he got back, Diane had committed suicide in the bathroom, and Mary was in his living room. He's been raising her since then.On the school bus one day, Mary witnesses bullying and she stands up for the victim, breaking the nose of the bully who's five years her senior. Frank is called to the Principal's office, where she tells him she can get a full ride for Mary at a nearby school for the gifted. Frank refuses the offer on the grounds that she wants Mary to have a normal childhood. The Principal then reaches out to Evelyn (Lindsay Duncan), Frank's mother and Mary's grandmother.Evelyn shows up at Frank's door soon after and meets Mary for the first time. She's a rich, bossy Englishwoman whose ideas of life and ambition Frank clearly disagrees with. She criticizes Frank's lifestyle choices and demands to take Mary away with her to Boston. When Frank disagrees, she takes him to court.In the court hearings and over that period of time, we find out more about the friction between Evelyn and Frank. Evelyn is disappointed in her dead daughter for being too weak to complete the Millennium Prize problem, disappointed in Frank for having quit his professorship at Boston University, and resentful of her late husband for disrupting her successful career. She's also having problems with her current husband, and they are separated. Frank doesn't openly accuse of her anything but insists that Evelyn will deny Mary the normalcy a child needs in her life and that him being a freelance boat repairman is perfectly fine. Roberta stands by Frank throughout the ordeal, and his lawyer (Glenn Plummer) does a good job defending him. In the end, though, Evelyn wants to settle by putting Mary in foster care in proximity to Frank's house and making her go to the school for gifted children.Crushed under the guilt of not having stayed with Diane the night of her death, and his insecurity over his capability for raising Mary, he yields. Mary is absolutely furious, however, and refuses to see Frank after he's left her with the foster family despite her relentless begging and tears. Frank is desolate, but is determined to do what everyone seems to think is best for Mary, when he finds out thanks to Bonnie that the foster family has put Mary's beloved one-eyed cat up for adoption.He rushes to the animal shelter and rescues Mary's car and two other last minute before they are put down. He finds out from the front desk at the shelter that the cat was brought there due to allergy issues. Knowing it's Evelyn who's allergic to cats, he makes a quick stop at his place and then rushes to the foster family's home to confront Evelyn. As he suspected, she's in the guest house with Mary and two tutors. Upon seeing him, Mary runs away. Frank follows suit after throwing a file on the desk and tells Evelyn she must see it. Evelyn tries to go after them but Roberta physically blocks her way and stops her. Frank manages to catch up to Mary and ask for forgiveness. Mary stops fighting and hugs him, and her spirits get even more elevated as she finds out her cat is at Frank's place safe and sound.When Mary and Frank return to the guesthouse, Roberta takes Mary to the car, and Frank orders the tutors out. We find that it's the finished proof for the Millennium Prize problem Diane had been working on. Evelyn says she doesn't believe it because she would have shared it with the world. Frank tells her that Diane gave him clear instructions to wait to publish it until after their mother's death. He tells her that she can go ahead and publish it, and leave Mary alone. Since she asks, he tells Evelyn that if she refuses, he'll take the folder away and wait to publish it until after Evelyn dies. Evelyn is shocked and in tears, but she takes the deal.At the end, Mary is shown attending classes at the university in the mornings, and the elementary school in the afternoons. Bonnie and Frank smile at each other with affection.
Storyline
- Frank Adler (Chris Evans) is a single man raising a child prodigy - his spirited young niece Mary (Mckenna Grace) in a coastal town in Florida. Frank's plans for a normal school life for Mary are foiled when the seven-year-old's mathematical abilities come to the attention of Frank's formidable mother Evelyn (Lindsay Duncan) whose plans for her granddaughter threaten to separate Frank and Mary. Octavia Spencer plays Roberta, Frank and Mary's landlady and best friend. Jenny Slate is Mary's teacher, Bonnie, a young woman whose concern for her student develops into a connection with her uncle as well. — Fox Searchlight Pictures In a small town near Tampa, Florida, seven-year-old Mary Adler lives with uncle and DE FACTO guardian, Frank. Her best friend is her 40-ish neighbor, Roberta. On her first day of first grade, she shows remarkable mathematical talent, which impresses her teacher, Bonnie Stevenson. There, despite her initial disdain for average children her own age and her boredom with their classwork, she begins to bond with them when she brings her one-eyed cat, Fred, for show-and-tell and later defends a classmate from a bully on the bus. Mary is offered a scholarship to a private school for gifted children. However, Frank turns it down. Based on his family's experiences with similar schools, he fears Mary will not have a chance at a normal childhood. Single Frank Adler, who works as a freelance boat repairman and lives in a trailer park on the Florida coast, has been guardian to his seven year old niece Mary Adler since she was a newborn after her mother, Frank's sister, Diane Adler, committed suicide. At the time, Frank was a Philosophy professor at Boston University, he moving with Mary in an effort to "escape". Like her mother, Mary is a math prodigy, of which Frank is well aware. Frank has home schooled Mary up until now in an effort to protect her from people like who he was escaping from, his and Diane's own mother, uncompromising (to use Frank's vernacular) Evelyn Adler, who, if she had custody, would have had a singular focus in the math prodigy aspect of Mary, much like she was with Diane. Frank, who has largely treated Mary like an equal in being up front with her about most things, has now decided to send Mary to a regular public school in an effort to socialize her to other children and to make her feel like a normal child, with their neighbor, adult Roberta Taylor, Mary's only real friend besides Frank. Roberta routinely sits with Mary to allow Frank his regular Friday out at the bar for himself. Although Frank cautions Mary about not being too "obvious" at school, Mary's teacher, Bonnie Stevenson, quickly discovers not only Mary's advanced math abilities, but her background being Diane's daughter. Although Miss Stevenson, like Frank, wants what's best holistically for Mary, the process to provide an advanced education to Mary at the expense of all else begins to snowball to the point where Evelyn learns of Frank and Mary's whereabouts. Not agreeing with any of Frank's choices, Evelyn sues for full custody, which brings into light the entire dynamic that existed and exists between Evelyn, Frank and Diane. — Huggo While living his carefree life as a boat repairman, Frank Adler is raising his seven year old niece Mary by himself in western Florida as her de facto guardian. While understanding her unbelievable mathematical abilities, he hopes she will be able to live a normal life, unlike his late sister and her late mother Diane. Frank enrolls Mary in public school as a first grader, despite her distaste for kids her own age. While there, the teacher learns of Mary's talents and requests that maybe Frank transfer her to a private school on a full ride. Frank declines, but begins seeing the teacher Bonnie outside of school. When Frank's mother Evelyn realizes what is going on, she hopes to move her to Boston and gain custody of her. During the custody battles, stories come to light of the relationship between Evelyn, Frank, and Diane. The case turns personal with no clear resolution in sight.
