. >> reporter: in some ways, the story of young piscine patel, kwn as pi, fies belief from the start. the son of a zoo keeper, the boy is raised hindu but also practices christianity and islam, to the disappointment of his father. >> you cannot follow three different religions at the same time, piscine. >> why not? >> because believing in everything at the same time is the same as not believing in anything at all. listen, instead of leaping from one religion to the next, why not start with reason. in a few hundred years, science has taken us farther in understanding the universe than the religion has in 10,000. >> science can teach us more about what is out there, but not what is in here. >> i much rather have you believe in something i don't agree with than to accept everything blindly, and that begins with thinking rationally. you understand? good. >> i would like to be baptized. >> the openness to faith that it asks for in others, without preaching, is what i think attracted me to the book to begin with and i think it's what i am most pleased with in the telling of the film. >> god