Product Details

• Actors: John Perry Barlow, Karen Black, David Brooks, Mark Capri, David Eppel
• Format: Color, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Fox Lorber
• VHS Release Date: October 3, 2000
• Run Time: 85 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00003M5I2
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #384,616 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Highly Unusual And Original, September 1, 2000

By 

carol irvin "carol irvin" (United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Conceiving Ada (DVD)

I wasn't expecting much from this film since I'd never heard of it. It had been released back in 1997 and I couldn't have missed something this good, could I? Not this movie-hound! It pains me to admit it but I indeed let this one slip by. The totally inventive idea is to have a woman genius of today's world, working on her computer to finish her research project, meet Ada Byron. This genius conceives a child with her lover while doing this work and shortly thereafter discovers she is able to communicate with Ada Byron, Lord Byron's daughter and the inventor of the computer, through her computer screen. We thereafter flip back and forth to the two worlds, learning more and more about Ada and even a bit about the woman carrying the baby and running the computer. There is even a visit to the OB-GYN with today's woman that shows something unusual is developing with the baby. Timothy Leary puts in what was probably a final screen appearance before his death as, what else, a guru for the woman genius. She consults him periodically and they discuss abstractions together. There are some highly original camera techniques used here that either required fairly new equipment/technology, a lot of imagination or both. IMDB lists this as a German production but it is performed in the English language and seems set in America and England. The reason I give it a 4 instead of a 5 is that at times the film got confusing. I think this was because the script was rough around the edges. If the writer had smoothed out the script and eliminated any potential confusion, this could have been a perfect 5. I'm going to watch it again and it may move up to that 5 if my confusion clears a second time through it. I recommend you give this a try, especially anyone interested in historical women bucking the odds back in what were barbaric times for them.

19 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Conceiving nothing!, June 18, 2005

By 

Gina Miller (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Conceiving Ada (DVD)

I am a true Ada Lovelace fan, I have books about her, books about Babbage, and her picture in my office, but this film is not about Ada. From the first moment the dialog began I cringed inside and any sliver of hope I had (even at this point), I knew was extremely wishful. The script was dreadful, it was reminiscent of someone you meet who upon trying to impress you, tries too hard, is a name dropper and talks incessantly about subjects you are informed of in a way that is immature and simply uncomfortable. If you are someone who understands the historical importance of Ada, this plot will be nothing but torture to you, and feel strikingly sacrilegious. This movie is not intelligent, but rather, it is insulting, has it's own agenda, takes credit for ideas that have been established by others, marries multiple plots into an annoying and badly acted overkill and is mostly disrespectful, as Ada's name has been used and defamed.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A well-measured dose of reality., January 27, 2004

By 

wiredweird "wiredweird" (Earth, or somewhere nearby) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Conceiving Ada (DVD)

First, the fiction: Perhaps the premise is a little contrived. Channeling the spirit of a famous Victorian woman into a PC (and more than the PC) is a bit improbable. Fine. Once that premise is in place, the plot stays within its own inner logic and moves forward quite well.

The reality, though, is what struck me. First, there is Ada herself. Yes, she was brilliant. She made a place for herself when all the places were reserved for men. We've heard that part. She was also a real, flawed human being, with a destructive gambling habit. Much of her interest in math and algorithms was centered on finding "the system" for beating the odds in horse races. Her creation of programming was driven by an urge that she could not control - like a flower that blooms because it grows in manure.

Emmy seems real, too, a fully mature "geek girl," but drawn with respect. She's intelligent, wholly wrapped up in her work, and also driven by a vision of her own. Best, she is completely a woman - not pretty, but beautiful, and not just a male role with a female actor. Emmy represents a character that I know and admire in real life. This is the first time I've seen it portrayed on screen, or at least portrayed so strongly.

Finally, the ethical question of Emmy's daughter is very real. The exact circumstance, as I said, is fiction. The issue is not: We have unprecedented control over what a baby, a new human being, can become. What kinds of control are morally acceptable? To tell the truth, I think Emmy took "what we can do" well past "what we should do."

//wiredweird