The answer is forty two. Correct?

Shakuntala Devi (2020) is loosely (if the disclaimer at the beginning of the movie is to be trusted, very loosely) based on the life of author, astrologer and mental calculator Shakuntala Devi, popularly known as the Human Computer.  It is the story of a fierce and fearless free spirit living life on her own terms, which can honestly be kind of terrifying.

Shakuntala is born into a poor Brahmin family in Bangalore, and from a very young age she demonstrates an amazing proficiency with mental mathematics.  Her father (Prakash Belawadi) sees an opportunity, and soon Shakuntala is supporting the family by touring local schools and demonstrating her skills.  Young Shakuntala (Spandan Chaturdevi) is particularly attached to her sister Sharada (Jiya Shah) and is devastated when Sharada suddenly dies.  Shakuntala blames her parents for not taking her sister to the hospital, and grows up angry.

After a few misadventures (including shooting a guy), adult Shakuntala (Vidya Balan) moves to London, where she meets Spanish mathematician Javier (Luca Calvani), who helps transform spunky village belle Shakuntala into the confident and sophisticated Shakuntala Devi, mathematical superstar.  And while the relationship with Javier fizzles out eventually, her career takes off; Shakuntala is wealthy and successful, touring the world to show people that she is good at math.

At a party, Shakuntala meets Paritosh Banerji (Jishu Sengupta.)  They fall in love, get married, have a daughter, and settle down in Calcutta.  Everything is wonderful . .  for a while.  Shakuntala decides that she misses performing, and heads back on the road, at first leaving baby Anu with Paritosh.  She finds that she misses her daughter, and so decides to take her on tour, which leads to the marriage collapsing.

So Shakuntala and Anu travel the world together.  But the trouble with free spirits who live life on theoir own terms is that sometimes they expect everyone else to live life on their terms as well.  As she grows up, Anu craves a sense of stability; she wants to lead a normal life, but normal is not something that Shakuntala Devi, the Human Computer, is willing to consider.  As an adult, a frustrated Anu (Sanya Malhotra) leaves to build her own life, but Shakuntala is willing to do anything to bring her back, even if that means they both end up in court.

As a performer, Vidya Balan has a light, effortless charm; I've seen her in a number of movies, and she is consistently delightful.  That's a useful talent to have when you're playing a woman who is so often smug and selfish.  Shakuntala is not always likable, but it's very hard to look away.

I'm not going to speculate about the actual Shakuntala Devi, who by all accounts built quite a life for herself, but movie Shakuntala reminds me of Shakespeare's sister.  Not the pop group, and not William Shakespeare's actual sister Joan, but Judith Shakespeare, the hypothetical equally talented sibling from Virginia Woolf's essay "A Room of One's Own."  Like Judith, Shakuntala is tremendously talented, but because of who she is, she's cut off from the traditional channels for that talent; she can perform at a school, but not attend one, appear before university maths departments and scholarly societies, but not join them.  Shakuntala gets a much happier ending than Judith does, but I can't help but wonder if the life of Shakun Dev would have been less complicated.