Introduction
A Beautiful Mind is a film in which Russell Crowe superbly played a brilliant schizophrenic mathematician. The film is based on the book by Sylvia Nazar, the story of the thorny path of one genius, his ups, downs, love, and suffering. An excerpt from it was published in the famous American Magazine Vanity Fair. There it was first read by producer B. Grazer who bought the rights to create the film. American producer and screenwriter Ron Howard became the director after long negotiations. This film is about a brilliant scientist who devoted his whole life to studying mathematics and fighting a serious illness. While watching, I admired Russell Crowe’s great acting and plot twists. The film proves that a person should not give up no matter what.
The History of Creation
In addition to the director, a screenwriter was also needed. Goldsman volunteered and worked a lot with the mentally ill as he developed methods for their cure. He came up with a move in which he visually could not understand for a long time that there were fictional characters next to Nash, for example, the niece of a roommate. Either a CIA agent looks very convincing for a long time. This is done so that the viewer can feel in Nash’s place. During the filming, complex makeup was applied – they are helping the hero grow old with silicone pads and dentures. All in order to make Russell Crowe look like a prototype of the main character in his old age.
Description
The film is biographical and describes the life of the Nobel laureate in economics John Nash. Accordingly, in the film, the hero’s name is exactly the same. In addition, the introverted genius student studies at Princeton University. There he is unfriendly but strikes up a relationship with a roommate. Then the talented scientist begins teaching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. However, he pays attention to a student on his estate of Alicia. Their sympathies become mutual, relationships develop, and young people get married.
Actors’ Play
Russell Crowe’s acting is as always on top; he got used to the role perfectly. The perfect acting helps the audience see only the character the actor is portraying. Everything is clean here; it is the “conditional” Nash who is in front of viewers, the man who is collected and at the same time absent-minded, constantly in the creative search, closed, absorbed in work. In addition, the scene of madness is well conveyed with the help of good direction and great music. Actors Ed Harris, Adam Goldberg, and Vivienne Cardone, who played Marcia, played their roles of hallucinations perfectly. The film was made as a blockbuster on the disintegration of personality and illness, and it looks like a blockbuster.
The Movie Realisation
In this film, everything is at the highest level: the plot, acting, staging, and musical accompaniment. Goosebumps on my skin involuntarily ran after these musical screensavers touched the strings of the soul. The film shows the loneliness and alienation of the smartest person and that a great mind is usually paired with great grief. Moreover, the movie shows the importance of loved ones’ support. At the end of the film, a viewer wonders how much a person should love life, and his family and be devoted to his work to survive and not break down. A viewer feels sincere joy for the heroes when, many years later, all the worst is over, Nash receives the Nobel Prize for discovery in the field of economics. The final speech of the main character will not leave indifferent even the stingiest person on emotions.
Schizophrenia
An important part of the film that hooked me is how the course of schizophrenia is shown. John’s autism manifests itself because he does not communicate with anyone except his hallucinatory friend (and, most importantly, does not suffer from a lack of communication). He does not cut his nails and monitor his appearance, and when talking to an interlocutor, he does not take a direct look. All this is not a natural sign of schizophrenia but maybe its consequence.
Paranoia
Paranoia is the second typical trait of a schizophrenic patient, which he acquires during the disease, even if he did not have it before. A person with a paranoid character from childhood considers others as his potential rivals and strives to surpass them in everything (A Beautiful Mind, 2001). That is why competition becomes the meaning of his life. In mentally ill people, paranoia takes on a monstrous scale and is accompanied by the development of megalomania and persecution mania with their inherent conspiracy delusions (this is how patients try to explain the reasons for their constant failures). In addition, with schizophrenia, hallucinations are added to this. In the case of the movie John Nash, viewers can again assume that paranoia in the form of an incredibly inflated conceit developed in him as a result of schizophrenia.
Conclusion
Summing up, I note that this movie is very deep in its content, and after watching it, there is something to think about. The film is about a man whose genius made his slave subdued, but he could cope with it and put it in the right direction: in the direction of creation, not destruction. This is a movie about a woman whose willpower and love helped the hero fight his illness. In addition, the film shows the twists and turns of fate, which viewers do not expect, and they sometimes break sharply and test for strength.
Work Cited
A Beautiful Mind. Directed by Ron Howard, performance by Russell Crowe. Universal Pictures, 2001.