Rachel's character is a teacher/philosopher. She was taught to question everything. In Alexandria during the break in the Roman Empire the Christians are ruling the city with murder and fear. The Roman Prefect, once her student, can do nothing to save her. She refuses to be Baptized and suffers for it. This movie shows the brutality of the Christian's against science and Jews. Before her end, she discovered that the Earth revoloved around the sun in an elipsis not a circle. All in all, I say: SEE IT - there should be more movies about women who challenge what we have been taught to believe.
I saw Agora when it first came out in NYC and loved Weisz' performance as Hypatia. Amenabar distorts some history in service to his art (the Library didn't end that way and Synesius wasn't a jerk), but that's what artists do. I don't go to the movies for history. For people who want to know more about the historical Hypatia, I highly recommend a very readable biography "Hypatia of Alexandria" by Maria Dzielska (Harvard University Press, 1995). I also have a series of posts on the historical events and characters in the film at my blog (http://faithljustice.wordpress.com) - not a movie review, just a "reel vs. real" discussion.
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