A Beautiful Mind: Going to hell and back

I was finally able to see this film last night, after much anticipation of wanting to see it. I wasn't disappointed either. Director Ron Howard and actors Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connolly, Paul Bettany and Ed Harris give us a terrifying journey into the visions of the schizophrenic mind, and what it must be like to live with it, both for the victim and those around them.

Mathematically precocious John Nash arrives at the hallowed halls of Princeton University to start his studies in the fields of calculus and mathematical theory. He's very much an outsider, with his cocksure attitude, West Virginia drawl, and as he puts it to his roommate Charles (Paul Bettany), a chip on both shoulders. If Nash has a brilliant mind, to balance that is an attitude and manner that is both snobbish and shy at the same time. Somehow, despite his unorthodox way of study, from skipping classes, to scrawling his theories on windowpanes, Nash manages to get a professorship for himself, and move onto being a teacher and researcher at MIT.

There, he meets one of his students, Alicia (Jennifer Connolly), who's smart, lovely, and drawn to the eccentric Nash. And to balance that budding romance, is the government offical Prichard (Ed Harris), who is sinister, shadowy, and determined to have Nash working as a code breaker for the goverment. Swinging between these two pendulums, Nash is spiralling towards disaster as his world becomes more and more awry, until at a lecture, Nash seccumbs to paranoia and the nightmare closes in on him.

At times this was a terrifying film to watch, from the barbarity of the mental care system of the fifties and sixties, with inmates being subjected to such things as "insulin shock therapy" -- a treatment that is no longer considered valid -- to the problems that the mentally ill face with their medications and their side effects, to the treatment that the mentally ill recieve in the outside world.

Especially touching here is the portrayal of Alicia Nash, by Jennifer Connolly. It's in this film that Ms. Connolly shines and shows true maturity as an actress. We follow her from when she met Nash at MIT, all the way through to the present day when she was at his side in the most unexpected of awards. Her courage and loyalty is remarkable, able to stretch over near tradegies and heartache.

The technical end of the film is wonderful as well, showing the world as John Nash sees it, as a place of hidden messages in magazines, a crowded bar, newspapers, and fleeting forms that may, or may not be, real. Lighting shifts, colors change, and it is entirely convincing. Ron Howard's direction is subtle as well, so that by the time the punch of the film arrives, it catches us by surprise and we are left horrified in our seats.

Other technical ends such as the score by James Horner, with vocals by Charlotte Church are excellent. Adapted by Akiva Goldsmith from the biography by Sylvia Nasar, it's worth watching. This might not be a complete portrait of John Nash, but it is certainly insightful.

For a much more complete view of the extraordinary life of John Nash, I happily recommend the companion book by Sylvia Nasar. It goes into much greater depths of Nash's career and work with the Rand Insititute, his other relationships, and the monumental 'game theory' that he created.