MATHEMATICAL FICTION:

a list compiled by Alex Kasman (College of Charleston)

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Excision (2012)
Richard Bates Jr (Director and Screenwriter)
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Contributed by Jessica Sklar

I watched a horror-and-coming-of-age film (think an arty version of "Carrie") called "Excision" last weekend, and was delighted to find that it had in it Malcolm McDowell in it, playing a high school math teacher. Not only that, but he teaches his students linear algebra (pretty advanced high school kids, eh?). There is a scene in which he questions his students about Cramer's Rule, and the whiteboard contains a fair amount of plausible-looking matrix theory, though I'd have to look at it again to know if it's legit (I was watching the movie in a theater at the time, so couldn't pause and ponder). Unfortunately, there was a glaring typo on the board: it says "Le A be an n x n matrix ..." Yes, "Le" instead of "Let." So sad that they messed up the English part of the math!

Be warned: it's not for people who don't like horror or gore.

More information about this work can be found at www.imdb.com.
(Note: This is just one work of mathematical fiction from the list. To see the entire list or to see more works of mathematical fiction, return to the Homepage.)

Works Similar to Excision
According to my `secret formula', the following works of mathematical fiction are similar to this one:
  1. The Hollow Man by Dan Simmons
  2. Straw Dogs by Sam Peckinpah (Director)
  3. Special Meal by Josh Malerman
  4. Solid Geometry by Ian McEwan
  5. Grigori’s Solution by Isobelle Carmody
  6. Forever Changes by Brendan Halpin
  7. Nightscape: The Dreams of Devils by David W. Edwards
  8. Yesternight by Cat Winters
  9. Mean Girls by Tina Fey (screenplay) / Mark S. Waters (director)
  10. Locker 49, or the Volunteers by David Rogers
Ratings for Excision:
RatingsHave you seen/read this work of mathematical fiction? Then click here to enter your own votes on its mathematical content and literary quality or send me comments to post on this Webpage.
Mathematical Content:
1/5 (1 votes)
..
Literary Quality:
2/5 (1 votes)
..

Categories:
GenreHorror,
MotifMath Education,
Topic
MediumFilms,

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Exciting News: The 1,600th entry was recently added to this database of mathematical fiction! Also, for those of you interested in non-fictional math books let me (shamelessly) plug the recent release of the second edition of my soliton theory textbook.

(Maintained by Alex Kasman, College of Charleston)