A brilliant but eccentric mathematician-cum-high school science teacher develops a crush on the fetching Hanaoka Yasuko , a saleswoman of bentos who lives next door with her daughter. Hanaoka, as it turns out, is something of a criminal. Having successfully murdered her abusive ex-husband in tandem with her daughter, she needs a foolproof alibi, and Ishigami draws on his scientific genius to help them construct one. The police are just as determined and resourceful, however, and enlist the support of their own scientist in the murder investigation, the equally brilliant and eccentric physicist Yukawa Manabu – who just happens to be an old classmate of Ishigami’s.
The spinoff movie from the popular J-drama Galileo. In this case, Yukawa Manabu aka Galileo comes up against a person who matches him in the brain department so who will crack first as the two try to outwit each other?
If you’re a fan of the Galileo TV series you may be disappointed by the lack of complicated pseudo-science in the movie’s mystery. Likewise, the chemistry between Yukawa and Detective Utsumi takes a back seat. What the movie is really about is a character drama between a single mother Hanaoka, a reclusive maths genius Ishigami, and Yukawa. The character of Ishigami is genuinely well played and intriguing. His interactions with Hanaoka and Yukawa are convincing and help to carry the movie.
As a mystery, the story was neither thrilling nor exciting, in my point of view. It was kind of too easy for me to guess what would happen next and what was awaiting in the end. The highlight of the TV drama was to shake the alibi of suspects through logical thinking and scientific approach; unfortunately the highlight seemed to be neglected in this movie.
Your enjoyment of the movie will boil down entirely to how much you’re willing to ignore Ishigami so-called “genius” plan which just doesn’t make any sense if you think about it properly. If you can switch your brain off and just enjoy the acting then the interaction between Ishigama, Yukawa and Hanaoka will keep you interested. Recommended for Galileo fans.
Sadako’s Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5
Sadako's Movie Shack 
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