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Jon Amiel’s biopic focuses on the struggles that Charles Darwin underwent while trying to write his seminal work The Origin of Species. Charles Darwin and his wife Emma, played by real-life married couple Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly, find their own ways of coping with their grief when their beloved daughter, Annie, dies. He immerses himself in his work and she finds comfort in her faith.

Jeremy Northam plays Reverend Innes, a family friend of the Darwins and the local minister. It is a small role, little more than a cameo but Jeremy does show you the conflict that this man feels as a consequence of being both a friend of the family and concerned for Charles Darwin’s health and well-being, together with the conflict he sees between his own belief system and the work of his friend. You do all too briefly get to hear the wonderful Northam voice lead the congregation in singing a hymn in church.

In addition to the two leads, Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly, and an excellent debut by Martha West as young Annie Darwin, Creation boasts an impressively strong supporting cast with Toby Jones, Benedict Cumberbatch, Jim Carter and Bill Paterson, and, of course, Jeremy Northam.

The screenplay was based on Randall Keynes’ book Annie’s Box. The film was released in the UK in September 2009 and the Region 2 DVD came out on January 18, 2010. Here’s the DVD blurb:

Creation is a deeply moving and inspirational story about how Charles Darwin overcame all obstacles to create one of the most explosive ideas in history to become one of the greatest scientists the world has ever known.

Paul Bettany plays Darwin at the point in his life where “On the Origin of Species” has been written, but remains unpublished. A warm and loving family man, we see Darwin experience his theories first-hand as he battles against illness; his own and that of his beloved daughter, Annie (Martha West). He is further torn by the compulsion to publish his revolutionary ideas and the potentially devastating effect they have on society and, in particular, his devoutly Christian wife, Emma (Jennifer Connelly).

The Region 2 DVD contains the following Special Features:

• Audio Commentary with Director Jon Amiel
• “The Battle for Charles Darwin” Making of Documentary
• “Debating Darwin”: 3 featurettes
• “Digging Deeper into Darwin”: 7 featurettes
• “Pollard on Film: Creation” featurette

The movie had a very limited festival and arthouse cinema release in the US in January 2010. The Region 1 DVD is scheduled for release on June 29, 2010, and is available to pre-order from amazon.com in either standard DVD format or on Blu-ray.