[Music] the e e e e e hey guys welcome back to the picture review Channel guys in today's video the movie we're going to talk about is called a beautiful mind we will talk about what this movie is all the interesting facts about this movie we are going to give you a detailed review of this movie and we will talk in detail about the technical department music department pre-production filming post- production budget and box office collection of this film we will also talk about the story of this film and I will also give you a small review of the story of this film apart from this we will discuss about the facts of this film storyline starcast actors's performance in the film and which character has played which role that's why I request you friends to watch this video till the end if you are visiting our channel for the first time don't forget to subscribe to our channel so let's start the video A Beautiful Mind is a 2001 American biographical drama film about the mathematician John Nash a Nobel laurate in economics played by Russell Crowe the film is directed by Ron Howard based on a screenplay by AKA goldsman who adapted the 1998 biography by Sylvia nassa in addition to Crow the film's cast features Ed Harris Jennifer Connelly Paul betney Adam Goldberg Jud hirs Josh Lucas Anthony rap and Christopher Plumber in supporting roles The Story begins in Nash's days as a brilliant but a social mathematics graduate student at Princeton University after Nash accepts secretive work in cryptography he becomes liable to a larger conspiracy through which he begins to question his reality A Beautiful Mind was released theatrically in the United States on December 21st 2001 one it went on to gross over 313 million worldwide and won four Academy Awards for Best Picture Best Director best adapted screenplay and best supporting actress for Conelly it was also nominated for best actor best film editing best makeup and best original score plot in 1947 John Nash arrives at Princeton University as a co-recipient with Martin Hansen of the Carnegie scholarship for mathematics he meets fellow Math and Science graduate students soul anley and Bender as well as his roommate Charles Herman a literature student determined to publish his own original idea Nash is inspired when he and his classmates discuss how to approach a group of women at a bar Hansen quotes Adam Smith advocating every man for himself but Nash argues that a Cooperative approach would lead to better chances of success which leads him to develop a new concept of governing Dynamics publishing an article on his theory he earns an appointment at M where he chooses Saul and Bender over Hansen to join him in 1953 Nash is invited to the Pentagon to study encrypted enemy telecommunications which he deciphers mentally bored with his regular duties at MIT including teaching he is recruited by the mysterious William parer of the United States Department of defense with a classified assignment to look for hidden patterns in magazines and newspapers to thwart a Soviet plot and is given an implanted diode that would give him a numeral passcode to a drop spot Nash becomes increasingly obsessive in his search for these patterns delivering his results to a secret mailbox and comes to believe he is being followed one of his students Alicia larde asks him to dinner and they fall in love on a return visit to Princeton Nash runs into Charles and his niece Marci with Charles's encouragement he proposes to Alicia and they marry Nash fears for his life after surviving a shootout between parer and Soviet agents and learns Alisia is pregnant but he is forced to continue his assignment while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University Nash tries to flee from people he thinks are Soviet agents led by a psychiatrist named Dr Rosen but is forcibly sedated and committed to a psychiatric facility Dr Rosen tells Alicia that Nash has schizophrenia and that Charles Marcy and parer exist only in his imagination Alysia meets with Saul and Bender Who show her husband's workroom which shows various news and magazines clippings and she finds the location of the secret mailbox at an abandoned mansion Alicia takes the many various unopened documents to Nash telling him that no one by the name of William parer is working in the defense department overcome with shock Nash slices his arm open to locate the diode but it is not there Nash is given a course of insulin shock therapy and eventually released frustrated with the side effects of his anti-choicers taking it and starts seeing Parcher and Charles again in 1956 Alicia discovers Nash has resumed his assignment in a shed near their home realizing he has relapsed Alicia rushes to the house to find Nash had left their infant son in the running bathtub believing Charles was watching the baby Alicia calls Dr Rosen but Nash accidentally knocks her and the baby to the ground believing he's saving both of them from parture as Alicia flees with the baby Nash fights with his visions and realizes that all of them have looked the same ever since he first saw them he stops Alicia's car and tells her he real realizes that Mary isn't real because she has not aged since the last time he saw her finally accepting that parer and other figures are hallucinations against Dr rosen's advice Nash chooses not to undergo hospitalization again believing he can deal with his symptoms himself and Alisia decides to stay and support him Nash returns to Princeton approaching his old rival Hansen now head of the mathematics Department who allows him to work out of the library and audit classes over the next two decades Nash learns to ignore his hallucinations and by the late 1970s is allowed to teach again in 1994 Nash is awarded the Nobel Memorial prize in economic Sciences for his revolutionary work on Game Theory and is honored by his fellow professors at the ceremony he dedicates the prize to his wife as Nash Alysia and their son leave the auditorium in Stockholm Nash sees Charles Marcy and parche watching him but merely glances at them before departing cast Russell Crow as John Nash Jennifer Connelly as Alicia Nash Ed Harris as William parer Christopher Plumber as Dr Rosen Paul betany as Charles Herman Adam Goldberg as Richard Soul Josh Lucas as Martin Hansen Anthony rap as Bender Jason Gray Stanford as anley neelon Jud hirsh as helinger Austin Pendleton as Thomas King Vivian Cardone as Mar Herman Killian Christian and Daniel cofan creen as baby development A Beautiful Mind was the second schizophrenia themed film that Ron Howard had planned to direct the first laws of Madness would have been based on the true story of schizophrenic Michael lordo who overcame difficult odds to successfully graduate from Yale law school Howard purchased the rights to loer life story for $1.5 million in 1995 and had Brad Pit slated to play the lead role however after lorder killed his fiance in 1998 in the midst of a psychotic episode plans for the movie were cancelled after producer Brian graser first read an excerpt of Sylvia nassar's 1998 book A Beautiful Mind in Vanity Fair magazine he immediately purchased the rights to the film graser later said that many A-list directors were calling with their point of view on the project he eventually brought the project to Ron Howard his longtime professional partner graser met with a number of screenwriters mostly consisting of serious dramatists but he chose AKA goldsman because of his strong passion and desire for the project Goldman's creative take on the project was to avoid having viewers understand they are viewing an alternative reality until a specific point in the film this was done to rob the viewers of their understanding to mimic how Nash comprehended his experien Howard agreed to direct the film based on the first draft he asked goldsman to emphasize the love story of Nash and his wife she was critical to his being able to continue living at home Dave berer a professor of mathematics at Barnard College Columbia University was consulted on the mathematical equations that appear in the film for the scene where Nash has to teach a Calculus class and gives them a complicated problem to keep them busy buer chose a problem physically realistic but mathematically very rich in keeping with Nash as someone who really doesn't want to teach the mundane details who will home in on what's really interesting berer received a cameo role in the film as a professor who lays his pen down for Nash in the pen ceremony near the end of the film Greg Canam was chosen to create the makeup effects for A Beautiful Mind specifically the age progression of the characters Crow had previously worked with Canam on the Insider Howard had also worked with Canam on cocoon each character's stages of makeup were broken down by the number of years that would pass between levels Canam stressed subtlety between the stages but worked toward the ultimate stage of older Nash the production team originally decided that the makeup Department would Age Russell Crow throughout the film however at Crow's request the makeup was used to push his look to resemble the facial features of John Nash Canam developed a new silicone type makeup that could simulate skin and be used for overlapping applications this shortened makeup application time from 8 to 4 hours Crow was also fitted with a number of Dentures to give him a slight overbite in the film Howard and graer chose frequent collaborator James horer to score the film because they knew of his ability to communicate Howard said regarding horer it's like having a conversation with a writer or an actor or another director a running discussion between the director and the composer was the concept of highlevel mathematics being less about numbers and solutions and more akin to a kaleidoscope in that the ideas evolve and change after the first screening of the film herner told Howard I see changes occurring like fast moving weather systems he chose it as another theme to connect to Nash's everchanging character Herer chose Welsh singer Charlotte Church to sing the soprano VOC after deciding that he needed a balance between a child and adult singing voice he wanted a purity Clarity and brightness of an instrument but also a vibrat to maintain the humanity of the voice the film was shot 90% chronologically three separate trips were made to the Princeton University campus during filming Howard decided that Nash's hallucinations should always be introduced first audibly and then visually this provides a clue for the the audience and establishes the hallucinations from Nash's point of view the historic John Nash had only auditory hallucinations the filmmakers developed a technique to represent Nash's mental epiphanies mathematicians described to them such moments as a sense of the smoke clearing flashes of light and everything coming together so the filmmakers used a flash of light appearing over an object or person to signify Nash's creativity at work two night shots were done at Fairley Dickinson University's campus in Floren Park New Jersey in the Vanderbilt mansion Ballroom portions of the film set at Harvard were filmed at Manhattan College Harvard has turned down most requests for onlocation filming ever since the filming of Love Story 1970 which caused significant physical damage to trees on campus Tom Cruz was considered for the lead role Howard ultimately cast Russell Crow for the role of Alicia Nash Rachel Weiss was offered the role but turned it down Charlies Theron and Julia orand auditioned for the role according to Ron Howard the four finalists for the role of Alicia were Ashley Jud Clare fani Mary McCormack and Jennifer Connelly with Connelly winning the role before the casting of Connelly Hillary Swank and Salma hyek were also candidates for the part box office during the 5-day weekend of the limited release a beautiful mind opened at the chapter 12 spot at the box office peaking at the T 2 spot following the wide release the film went on to gross 17,745 341 PLS in the United States and Canada and 33,42 through $341 worldwide the Nobel Prize winner John Forbes Nash junor still teaches at Princeton and walks to campus every day that these commonplace statement nearly brought tears to my eyes suggest the power of a beautiful mind the story of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians and a victim of schizophrenia Nash's discoveries in Game Theory have an impact on our lives every day he also believed for a time that Russians were sending him coded messages on the front page of the New York Times A Beautiful Mind Stars Russell Crow as Nash and Jennifer Connelly as his wife Alicia who is pregnant with their child when the first symptoms of his disease become apparent it tells the story of a man whose mind was of enormous service to humanity while at the same time betrayed him with frightening delusions Crow brings the character to Life by sidest stepping sensationalism and building with small behavioral details he shows a man who descends into madness and then unexpectedly regains the ability to function in the academic world Nash has been compared to Newton mle and Darwin but was also for many years just a man muttering to himself in the corner director Ron Howard is able to suggest a core of goodness in Nash that inspired his wife and others to stand by him to keep hope and in her words in his darkest hour to believe that something extraordinary is possible the movie's Nash begins as a quiet but cocky young man with a West Virginia accent who gradually turns into a tortured secretive paranoid who believes he is a spy being being trailed by government agents Crow who has an uncanny ability to modify his look to fit a role always seems convincing as a man who ages 47 years during the film The Early Nash seen at Princeton in the late 1940s calmly tells a scholarship winner there is not a single seminal idea on either of your papers when he loses at a game of Go he explains I had the first move my play was perfect the game is Flor Lord he is aware of his impact on others I don't much like people and they don't much like me and recalls that his first grade teacher said he was born with two helpings of brain and a half helping of heart it is Alicia who helps him find the heart she is a graduate student when they meet is attracted to his genius is touched by his loneliness is able to accept his idea of courtship when he informs her ritual requires we proceed with a number of platonic activities before we have sex to the degree that he can be touched she touches him although often he seems trapped inside himself Sylvia Nassar who wrote the 1998 biography that informs AKA Goldman's screenplay begins her book by quoting Wordsworth about a man forever voyaging through strange Seas of thought alone Nas's schizophrenia takes a literal visual form he believes he is being pursued by a federal agent Ed Harris and imagines himself in Chase scenes that seem inspired by 1940s crime movies he begins to find patterns where no patterns exist one night he and Alicia stand under the sky and he asks her to name any object and then connect stars to draw it romantic but it's not so romantic when she discovers his office thickly papered with countless bits torn from newspapers and magazines and connected by frantic lines into a imaginary patterns the movie traces his treatment by an understanding psychiatrist Christopher Plumber and his agonizing courses of insulin shock therapy medication helps him improve somewhat but only of course when he takes the medication eventually newer drugs are more effective and he begins a tentative re-entry into the academic world at Princeton the movie fascinated me about the life of this man and I sought more information finding that for many years he was a recluse wandering the campus talking to No One drinking coffee smoking cigarettes paging through piles of newspapers and magazines and then one day he paid a quite ordinary compliment to a colleague about his daughter and it was noticed that Nash seemed better there is a remarkable scene in the movie when a representative for the Nobel committee Austin Pendleton comes visiting and hints that he is being considered for the prize Nash observes that people are usually informed they have won not that they are being considered you came here to find out if I am crazy and would screw everything up if I won he did win and did not screw everything up the movies have a way of pushing mental illness into Corners it is grotesque Sensational cute funny willful tragic or perverse here it is simply a disease which renders life almost but not quite impossible for Nash and his wife before he becomes one of the lucky ones to pull out of the downward spiral when he won the Nobel Nash was asked to write about his life and he was honest enough to say his recovery is not entirely a matter of Joy he observes without his Madness zarathustra would necessarily have been only another of the millions or billions of human individuals who have lived and then been forgotten without his Madness would Nash have also lived and then been forgotten did his ability to penetrate the most difficult reaches of mathematical thought somehow come with a price attached the movie does not know and cannot say A Beautiful Mind is a 2001 American biographical drama film about the mathematician John Nash a Nobel laurate in economics played by Russell Crow the film is directed by Ron Howard based on a screenplay by AKA goldsman who adapted the 1998 biography by Sylvia nassa in addition to Crow the film's cast features Ed Harris Jennifer Connelly Paul betney Adam Goldberg Jud hirs Josh Lucas Anthony rap and Christopher Plumber in supporting roles The Story begins in Nash's days as a brilliant but a social mathematics graduate student at Princeton University after Nash accepts secretive work in cryptography he becomes liable to a Lar a conspiracy through which he begins to question his reality A Beautiful Mind was released theatrically in the United States on December 21st 2001 it went on to gross over 313 million worldwide and won four Academy Awards for Best Picture Best Director best adapted screenplay and best supporting actress for Connelly it was also nominated for best actor best film editing best makeup and best original score plot in 1947 John Nash arrives at Princeton University as a co-recipient with Martin Hansen of the Carnegie scholarship for mathematics he meets fellow Math and Science graduate students soul anley and Bender as well as his roommate Charles Herman a literature student determined to publish his own original idea Nash is inspired when he and his classmates discuss how to approach a group of women at a bar Hansen quotes Adam Smith advocating every man for himself but Nash argues that a Cooperative approach would lead to better chances of success which leads him to develop a new concept of governing Dynamics publishing an article on his theory he earns an appointment at MIT where he chooses sa and Bender over Hansen to join him in 1953 Nash is invited to the Pentagon to study encrypted enemy telecommunications which he deciphers mentally bored with his regular duties at MIT including teaching he is recruited by the mysterious William parer of the United States Department of Defense with a classified assignment to look for hidden patterns in magazines and newspapers to thwart a Soviet plot and is given an implanted diode that would give him a numeral passcode to a drop spot Nash becomes increasingly obsessive in his search for these patterns delivering his results to a a secret mailbox and comes to believe he is being followed one of his students Alicia larde asks him to dinner and they fall in love on a return visit to Princeton Nash runs into Charles and his niece marcii with Charles's encouragement he proposes to Alicia and they marry Nash fears for his life after surviving a shootout between parer and Soviet agents and learns Alicia is pregnant but he is forced to continue his assignment while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University Nash tries to flee from people he thinks are Soviet agents led by a psychiatrist named Dr Rosen but is forcibly sedated and committed to a psychiatric facility Dr Rosen tells Alicia that Nash has schizophrenia and that Charles Marcy and parer exist only in his imagination Alicia meets with Saul and Bender Who show her husband's workroom which shows various news and magazines clippings and she finds the location of the secret mailbox at an abandoned mansion Alicia takes the many various unopened documents to Nash telling him that no one by the name of William parer is working in the defense department overcome with shock Nash slices his arm open to locate the diode but it is not there Nash is given a course of insulin shock therapy and eventually released frustrated with the side effects of his antipsychotic medication he secretly stops taking it and starts seeing parcha and Charles again in 1956 Alicia discovers Nash has resumed his assignment in a shed near their home realizing he has relapsed Alicia rushes to the house to find Nash had left their infant son in the running bathtub believing Charles was watching the baby Alicia calls Dr Rosen but Nash accidentally knocks her and the baby to the ground believing he's saving both of them from parture as Alicia flees with the baby Nash fights with his visions and realizes that all of them have looked the same ever since he first saw them he stops alysia's car and tells her he realizes that Marcy isn't real because she has not aged since the last time he saw her finally accepting that parture and other figures are hallucinations against Dr rosen's advice Nash chooses not to undergo hospitalization again believing he can deal with his symptoms himself and at least decides to stay and support him Nash returns to Princeton approaching his old rival Hansen now head of the mathematics Department who allows him to work out of the library and audit classes over the next two decades Nash learns to ignore his hallucinations and by the late 1970s is allowed to teach again in 1994 Nash is awarded the Nobel Memorial prize in economic Sciences for his revolutionary work on Game Theory and his honored by his fellow professors at the ceremony he dedicates the prize to his wife as Nash Alysia and their son leave the auditorium in Stockholm Nash sees Charles Marcy and parche watching him but merely glances at them before departing cast Russell Crow as John Nash Jennifer Connelly as Alicia Nash Ed Harris as William parer Christopher Plumber as Dr Rosen poor betany as Charles Herman Adam Goldberg as Richard soul Josh Lucas as Martin Hansen Anthony rap as Bender Jason Grey Stanford as anley neelen Jud hirs as helinger Austin Pendleton as Thomas King Vivian Cardone as Mar Herman Killian Christian and Daniel cofan creen as baby development A Beautiful Mind was the second schizophrenia themed film that Ron Howard had planned to direct the first laws of Madness would have been based on the true story of schizophrenic Michael Lor who overcame difficult odds to successfully graduate from Yale law school Howard purchased the rights to loader's life story for $1.5 million in 1995 and had Brad Pit slated to play the lead role however after lorder killed his fianceƩ in 1998 in the midst of a psychotic episode plans for the movie were cancelled after producer Brian graser first read an excerpt of Sylvia nassar's 1998 book A Beautiful Mind in Vanity Fair magazine he immediately purchased the rights to the film graser later said that many A-list directors were calling with their point of view on the project he eventually brought the project to Ron Howard his longtime professional partner graser met with a number of screen writers mostly consisting of serious dramatists but he chose AKA goldsman because of his strong passion and desire for the project Goldman's creative take on the project was to avoid having viewers understand that are viewing an alternative reality until a specific point in the film this was done to rob the viewers of their understanding to mimic how Nash comprehended his experiences Howard agreed to direct the film based on the first draft he asked goldsman to emphasiz the love story of Nash and his wife she was critical to his being able to continue living at home Dave berer a professor of mathematics at Barnard College Columbia University was consulted on the mathematical equations that appear in the film for the scene where Nash has to teach a Calculus class and gives them a complicated problem to keep them busy Baer chose a problem physically unrealistic but mathematically very rich in keeping with Nash as someone who really doesn't want to teach the mundane details who will home in on what's really interesting berer received a cameo role in the film as a professor who lays his pen down for Nash in the pen ceremony near the end of the film Greg canum was chosen to create the makeup effects for A Beautiful Mind specifically the age progression of the characters Crow had previously worked with Canam on The Insider Howard had also worked with Canam on cocoon each character's stages of makeup were broken down by the number of years that would pass between levels Canam stressed subtlety between the stages but worked toward the ultimate stage of older Nash the production team originally decided that the makeup Department would Age Russell Crow throughout the film however at Crow's request the makeup was used to push his look to resemble the facial features of John Nash canum developed a new silicone type makeup that could simulate skin and be used for overlapping applications this shortened makeup application time from 8 to 4 hours Crow was also fitted with a number of Dentures to give him a slight overbite in the film Howard and graser chose frequent collaborator James Herer to score the film because they knew of his ability to communicate Howard said regarding Herer it's like having a conversation with a writer or an actor or another director a running discussion between the director and the composer was the concept of highlevel mathematics being less about numbers and solutions and more akin to a kaleidoscope in that the ideas evolve and change after the first screening of the film Herer told Howard I see changes occurring like fast moving weather systems he chose it as another theme to connect to Nash's everchanging character Herer chose Welsh singer Charlotte Church to sing the soprano vocals after deciding that he needed a balance between a child and adult singing voice he wanted a purity Clarity and brightness of an instrument but also a vibr to maintain the humanity of the voice the film was shot 90% chronologically three separate trips were made to the Princeton University campus during filming Howard decided that Nash's hallucinations should always be introduced first audibly and then visually this provides a clue for the audience and establishes the hallucinations from Nash's point of view the historic John Nash had only auditory hallucinations the filmmakers developed a technique to represent Nash's mental epiphanies mathematicians describe to them such moments as a sense of the smoke clearing flashes of light and everything coming together so the filmmakers used a flash of light appearing over an object or person to signify Nash's creativity at work two night shots were done at Fairley Dickinson University's campus in florum Park New Jersey in the Vanderbilt mansion Ballroom portions of the film set at Harvard were filmed at Manhattan College Harvard has turned down most requests for onlocation filming ever since the filming of Love Story 1970 which caused significant physical damage to trees on campus Tom Cruz was considered for the lead role Howard ultimately cast Russell Crowe for the role of Alicia Nash Rachel Weiss was offered the role but turned it down Charlies Theron and Julia orand auditioned for the role according to Ron Howard the four finalists for the role of Alicia were Ashley Jud CLA fani Mary McCormack and Jennifer Connelly with Connelly winning the role before the cast of Connelly Hillary Swank and Salma Hayek were also candidates for the part box office during the 5day weekend of the limited release A Beautiful Mind opened at the chapter 12 spot at the box office peaking at the tap 2 spot following the wide release the film went on to gross 17,745 341 CLS in the United States and Canada and 31342 the 341 $1 worldwide the Nobel Prize winner John Forbes Nash Jr still teaches at Princeton and walks to campus every day that these commonplace statements nearly brought tears to my eyes suggest the power of a beautiful mind the story of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians and a victim of schizophrenia Nash's discoveries in Game Theory have an impact on our lives every day he also believed for a time that Russians were sending him coded messages on the front page of the New York Times A Beautiful Mind Stars Russell Crow as Nash and Jennifer Connelly as his wife Alicia who is pregnant with their child when the first symptoms of his disease become apparent it tells the story of a man whose mind was of enormous service to humanity while at the same time betrayed him with frightening delusions Crow brings the character to Life by sidest stepping sensationalism and building with small behavioral details he shows a man who descends into madness and then unexpectedly regains the ability to function in the academic world Nash has been compared to Newton mendle and Darwin but was also for many years just a man muttering to himself in the corner director Ron Howard is able to suggest a core of goodness in Nash that inspired his wife and others to stand by him to keep hope and in her words in his darkest hour to believe that something extraordinary is possible the movie's Nash begins as a quiet but cocky young man with a West Virginia accent who gradually turns into a tortured secretive paranoid who believes he is a spy being trailed by government agents Crow who has an uncanny ability to modify his look to fit a role always seems convincing as a man who ages 47 years during the film The Early Nash seen at Princeton in the late 1940s calmly tells a scholarship winner there is not a single seminal idea on either of your papers when he loses at a game of Go he explains I had the first move my play was perfect the game is flawed he is aware of his impact on others I don't much like people and they don't much like me and recalls that his first grade teacher said he was born with two helpings of brain and a half helping of heart it is Alicia who helps him find the heart she is a graduate student when they meet is attracted to his gen IUS is touched by his loneliness is able to accept his idea of courtship when he informs her ritual requires we proceed with a number of platonic activities before we have sex to the degree that he can be touched she touches him although often he seems trapped inside himself Sylvia Nassar who wrote the 1998 biography that informs AA Goldman's screenplay begins her book by quoting Wordsworth about a man forever Vo surging through strange Seas of thought alone Nasha schizophrenia takes a literal visual form he believes he is being pursued by a federal agent Ed Harris and imagines himself in Chase scenes that seem inspired by 1940s crime movies he begins to find patterns where no patterns exist one night he and Alisia stand under the sky and he asks her to name any object and then connects stars to draw it Roman IC but it's not so romantic when she discovers his office thickly papered with countless bits torn from newspapers and magazines and connected by frantic lines into imaginary patterns the movie traces his treatment by an understanding psychiatrist Christopher Plumber and his agonizing courses of insulin shock therapy medication helps him improve somewhat but only of course when he takes the medication eventually newer drugs are more effective and he begins a tentative re-entry into the academic world at Princeton the movie fascinated me about the life of this man and I sought more information finding that for many years he was a recluse wandering the campus talking to No One drinking coffee smoking cigarettes paging through piles of newspapers and magazines and then one day he paid a quite ordinary compliment to a colleague about his daughter and it was noticed that Nash seemed better there there is a remarkable scene in the movie when a representative for the Nobel committee Austin Pendleton comes visiting and hints that he is being considered for the prize Nash observes that people are usually informed they have won not that they are being considered you came here to find out if I am crazy and would screw everything up if I won he did win and did not screw everything up the movies have a way of pushing mental illness into Corners it is grotesque Sensational cute funny willful tragic or perverse here it is simply a disease which renders life almost but not quite impossible for Nash and his wife before he becomes one of the lucky ones to pull out of the downward spiral when he won the Nobel Nash was asked to write about his life and he was honest enough to say his recovery is not entirely a matter of Joy he observes without his Madness zarathustra would necessarily have been only another of the millions or billions of human individuals who have lived and then been forgotten without his Madness would Nash have also lived and then been forgotten did his ability to penetrate the most difficult reaches of mathematical thought somehow come with a price attached the movie does not know and cannot say A Beautiful Mind is a 2001 American biographical drama film about the mathemat I John Nash a Nobel laurate in economics played by Russell Crowe the film is directed by Ron Howard based on a screenplay by AKA goldsman who adapted the 1998 biography by Sylvia nassa in addition to Crow the film's cast features Ed Harris Jennifer Connelly Paul betney Adam Goldberg Jud Hirsch Josh Lucas Anthony rap and Christopher Plumber in supporting roles The Story begins in na his days as a brilliant but a social mathematics graduate student at Princeton University after Nash accepts secretive work in cryptography he becomes liable to a larger conspiracy through which he begins to question his reality A Beautiful Mind was released theatrically in the United States on December 21st 2001 it went on to gross over 313 million worldwide and won four Academy Awards for Best Picture best director best adapted screenplay and best supporting actress for Connelly it was also nominated for best actor best film editing best makeup and best original score plot in 1947 John Nash arrives at Princeton University as a co-recipient with Martin Hansen of the Carnegie scholarship for mathematics he meets fellow Math and Science graduate students soul anley and Bender as well as his roommate Charles Herman a literature student determined to publish his own original idea Nash is inspired when he and his classmates discuss how to approach a group of women at a bar Hansen quotes Adam Smith advocating every man for himself but Nash argues that a Cooperative approach would lead to better chances of success which leads him to develop a new concept of governing Dynamics publishing an article on his theory he earns an appointment at MIT where he chooses sa and Bender over Hansen to join him in 1953 Nash is invited to the Pentagon to study encrypted enemy telecommunications which he deciphers mentally bored with his regular duties at MIT including teaching he is recruited by the mysterious William parer of the United States Department of Defense with a classified assignment to look for hidden patterns in magazines and newspapers to thwart a Soviet plot and is given an implanted diode that would give him a numeral passcode to a drop spot Nash becomes increasingly obsessive in his search for these patterns delivering his results to a secret mailbox and comes to believe he is being followed one of his students Alicia larde asks him to dinner and they fall in love on a return visit to Princeton Nash runs into Charles and his niece Marc with Charles's encouragement he proposes to Alicia and they marry Nash fears for his life after surviving a shootout between parer and Soviet agents and learns Alisia is pregnant but he is forced to continue his assignment while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University Nash tries to flee from people he thinks are Soviet agents led by a psychiatrist named Dr Rosen but is forcibly sedated and committed to a psychiatric facility Dr Rosen tells Alysia that Nash has schizophrenia and that Charles Marcy and parer exist only in his imagination Alysia meets with Saul and Bender Who show her husband's workroom which shows various news and magazines clippings and she finds the location of the secret mailbox at an abandoned mansion Alisia takes the many various unopened documents to Nash telling him that no one by the name of William parer is working in the defense department overcome with shock Nash slices his arm open to locate the diode but it is not there Nash is given a course of insulin shock therapy and eventually released frustrated with the side effects of his anti-yo medication he secretly stops taking it and starts seeing parer and Charles again in 1956 Alicia discovers Nash has resumed his assignment in a shed near their home realizing he has relapsed Alicia rushes to the house to find Nash had left their infant son in the running bathtub believing Charles was watching the baby Alicia calls Dr Rosen but Nash accidentally knocks her and the baby to the ground believing he's saving both of them from parture as Alicia flees with the baby Nash fights with his visions and realizes that all of them have looked the same ever since he first saw them he stops Alicia's car and tells her he realizes that Mary isn't real because she has not aged since the last time he saw her finally accepting that parture and other figures are hallucinations against Dr rosen's advice Nash chooses not to undergo hospitalization again believing he can deal with his symptoms himself and Elicia decides to stay and support him Nash returns to Princeton approaching his old rival Hansen now head of the mathematics Department who allows him to work out of the library and audit classes over the next two decades Nash learns to ignore his hallucinations and by the late 1970s is is allowed to teach again in 1994 Nash is awarded the Nobel Memorial prize in economic Sciences for his revolutionary work on Game Theory and is honored by his fellow professors at the ceremony he dedicates the prize to his wife as Nash Alysia and their son leave the auditorium in Stockholm Nash sees Charles Marcy and parche watching him but merely glances at them before departing cast Russell Crow as John Nash Jennifer Conelly as Alicia Nash Ed Harris as William parer Christopher Plumber as Dr Rosen Paul betany as Charles Herman Adam Goldberg as Richard Soul Josh Lucas as Martin Hansen Anthony rap as Bender Jason Gray Stanford as Angley neelsen Jud hirh as helinger Austin Pendleton as Thomas King Vivian Cardone as Mar Herman Killian Christian and Daniel cofan creen as baby development A Beautiful Mind was the second schizophrenia themed film that Ron Howard had planned to direct the first laws of Madness would have been based on the true story of schizophrenic Michael lordo who overcame difficult odds to successfully graduate from Yale law school Howard purchased the rights to loader's life story for $1.5 million in 1995 and had Brad Pit slated to play the lead role however after lorder killed his fiance in 1998 in the midst of a psychotic episode plans for the movie were cancelled after producer Brian graser first read an excerpt of Sylvia nassar's 1998 book A Beautiful Mind in Vanity Fair magazine he immediately purchased the rights to the film graser later said that many alist directors were calling with their point of view on the project he eventually brought the project to Ron Howard his longtime professional partner graser met with a number of screenwriters mostly consisting of serious dramatists but he chose AKA goldsman because of his strong passion and desire for the project Goldman's creative take on the project was to avoid having viewers understand they are viewing an alternative reality until a specific point in the film this was done to rob the viewers of their understanding to mimic how Nash comprehended his experiences Howard agreed to direct the film based on the first draft he asked goldsman to emphasize the love story of Nash and his wife she was critical to his being able to continue living at home Dave berer a professor of mathematics at Barnard College Columbia University was consulted on the mathematical equations that appear in the film for the scene where Nash has to teach a Calculus class and gives them a complicated problem to keep them busy buer chose a problem physically unrealistic but mathematically very rich in keeping with Nash as someone who really doesn't want to teach the mundane details who will home in on what's really interesting berer received a cameo role in the film as a professor who lays his pen down for Nash in the pen ceremony near the end of the film Greg Canam was chosen to create the makeup effects for A Beautiful Mind specifically the age progression of the characters Crow had previously worked with Canam on The Insider Howard had also worked with Canam on cocoon each character's stages of makeup were broken down by the number of years that would pass between levels canum stressed subtlety between the stages but worked toward the ultimate stage of older Nash the production team originally decided that the makeup Department would Age Russell Crow throughout the film however at Crow's request the makeup was used to push his look to resemble the facial features of John Nash Canam developed a new silicone type makeup that could simulate skin and be used for overlapping applications this shortened makeup application time from 8 to 4 4 hours Crow was also fitted with a number of Dentures to give him a slight overbite in the film Howard and graser chose frequent collaborator James Herer to score the film because they knew of his ability to communicate Howard said regarding Herer it's like having a conversation with a writer or an actor or another director a running discussion between the director and the composer was the concept of highlevel mathematics being less about numbers and solutions and more akin to a kaleidoscope in that the ideas evolve and change after the first screening of the film Herer told Howard I see changes occurring like fast moving weather systems he chose it as another theme to connect to Nash's everchanging character Herer chose Welsh singer Charlotte Church to sing the soprano vocals after deciding that he needed a balance between a child and adult singing voice he wanted a purity Clarity and brightness of an instrument but also a vibrat to maintain the humanity of the voice the film was shot 90% chronologically three separate trips were made to the Princeton University campus during filming Howard decided that Nash's hallucinations should always be introduced first audibly and then visually this provides a clue for the audience and establishes the hallucinations from Nash's point of view the historic John Nash had only auditory hallucinations the filmmakers developed a technique to represent Nash's mental epiphanies mathematicians describ to them such moments as a sense of the smoke clearing flashes of light and everything coming together so the filmmakers used a flash of light appearing over an object or person to signify Nash's creativity at work two night shots were done at Fairley Dickinson University's campus in florum Park New Jersey in the Vanderbilt mansion Ballroom portions of the film set at Harvard were filmed at Manhattan College Harvard has turned down most requests for onlocation filming ever since the filming of Love Story 1970 which caused significant physical damage to trees on campus Tom Cruz was considered for the lead role Howard ultimately cast Russell Crowe for the role of Alicia Nash Rachel Weiss was offered the role but turned it down Charlies Theron and Julia orand auditioned for the role according to Ron Howard the four finalists for the role of Alicia were Ashley Jud CLA fani Mary McCormack and Jennifer Connelly with Connelly winning the role before the casting of Connelly Hillary Swank and Salma hyek were also candidates for the part box office during the 5-day weekend of the limited release A Beautiful Mind opened at the chapter 12 spot at the box office peing at the tetu spot following the wide release the film went on to gross 7,742 341 CLS in the United States and Canada and 31342 through $341 worldwide the Nobel Prize winner John Forbes Nash Jr still teaches at Princeton and walks to campus every day that these commonplace statements nearly brought tears to my eyes suggest the power of a beautiful mind the story of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians and a victim of schizophrenia Nash's discoveries in Game Theory have an impact on our lives every day he also believed for a time that Russians were sending him coded messages on the front page of the New York Times A Beautiful Mind Stars Russell Crow as Nash and Jennifer Connelly as his wife Alicia who is pregnant with their child when the first symptoms of his disease become apparent it tells the story of a man whose mind was of enormous service to humanity while at the same time betrayed him with frightening delusions Crow brings the character to Life by sidest stepping sensationalism and building with small behavioral details he shows a man who descends into madness and then unexpectedly regains the ability to function in the academic world Nash has been compared to Newton Mendel and Darwin but was also for many years just a man muttering to himself in the corner director Ron Howard is able to suggest a core of goodness in Nash that that inspired his wife and others to stand by him to keep hope and in her words in his darkest hour to believe that something extraordinary is possible the movie's Nash begins as a quiet but cocky young man with a West Virginia accent who gradually turns into a tortured secretive paranoid who believes he is a spy being trailed by government agents Crow who has an uncanny ability to modify his look to fit a role always seems convincing as a man who ages 40 7 years during the film The Early Nash seen at Princeton in the late 1940s calmly tells a scholarship winner there is not a single seal idea on either of your papers when he loses at a game of Go he explains I had the first move my play was perfect the game is flawed he is aware of his impact on others I don't much like people and they don't much like me and recalls that his first grade teacher said he was born with two helpings of brain and a half helping of heart it is Alicia who helps him find the heart she is a graduate student when they meet is attracted to his genius is touched by his loneliness is able to accept his idea of courtship when he informs her ritual requires we proceed with a number of platonic activities before we have sex to the degree that he can be touched she touches him although often he seems trapped inside himself Sylvia Nassar who wrote the 1998 biography that informs AKA Goldman's screenplay begins her book by quoting Wordsworth about a man forever voyaging through strange Seas of thought alone Nasha schizophrenia takes a literal visual form he believes he is being pursued by a federal agent Ed Harris and imagines himself in Chase scenes that seem inspired by 1940s crime movies he begins to find patterns where no patterns exist one night he and Alisia stand under the sky and he asks her to name any object and then connect stars to draw it romantic but it's not so romantic when she discovers his office thickly papered with countless bits torn from newspapers and magazines and connected by frantic lines into imaginary patterns the movie traces his treatment by an understanding psychiatrist Christopher Plumber and his agonizing courses of insulin shock therapy medication helps him improve somewhat but only of course when he takes the medication eventually newer drugs are more effective and he begins a tentative re-entry into the academic world at Princeton the movie fascinated me about the life of this man and I sought more information finding that for many years he was a recluse wandering the campus talking to No One drinking coffee smoking cigarettes paging through piles of newspaper papers and magazines and then one day he paid a quite ordinary compliment to a colleague about his daughter and it was noticed that Nash seemed better there is a remarkable scene in the movie when a representative for the Nobel committee Austin Pendleton comes visiting and hints that he is being considered for the prize Nash observes that people are usually informed they have won not that they are being considered you came here to find out if I am crazy and would screw everything up if I won he did win and did not screw everything up the movies have a way of pushing mental illness into Corners it is grotesque Sensational cute funny willful tragic or perverse here it is simply a disease which renders life almost but not quite impossible for Nash and his wife before he becomes one of the lucky ones to pull out of the downward spiral when he won the Nobel Nash was asked to write about his life and he was honest enough to say his recovery is not entirely a matter of Joy he observes without his Madness zarathustra would necessarily have been only another of the millions or billions of human individuals who have lived and then been forgotten without his Madness would Nash have also lived and then been forgotten did his ability to penetrate the most difficult reaches of mathematical thought somehow come with a price attached the movie does not know and cannot say A Beautiful Mind is a 2001 American biographical drama film about the mathematician John Nash a Nobel laurate in economics played by Russell Crowe the film is directed by Ron Howard based on a screenplay by AKA goldsman who adapted the 1998 biography by Sylvia nassa in addition to Crow the film's cast features Ed Harris Jennifer Connelly Paul betney Adam Goldberg Jud Hirsch Josh Lucas Anthony rap and Christopher Plumber in supporting roles The Story begins in Nash's days as a brilliant but a social mathematics graduate student at Princeton University after Nash accepts secretive work in cryptography he becomes liable to a larger conspiracy through which he begins to question his reality A Beautiful Mind was released theatrically in the United States on December 21th first 2001 it went on to gross over 313 million worldwide and won four Academy Awards for Best Picture Best Director best adapted screenplay and best supporting actress for Connelly it was also nominated for best actor best film editing best makeup and best original score plot in 1947 John Nash arrives at Princeton University as a co-recipient with Martin Hansen of the Carnegie scholarship for mathematics he meets fellow Math and Science graduate students Soul Ansley and Bender as well as his roommate Charles Herman a literature student determined to publish his own original idea Nash is inspired when he and his classmates discuss how to approach a group of women at a bar Hansen quotes Adam Smith advocating every man for himself but Nash argues that a Cooperative approach would lead to better Chan of success which leads him to develop a new concept of governing Dynamics publishing an article on his theory he earns an appointment at MIT where he chooses Saul and Bender over Hansen to join him in 1953 Nash is invited to the Pentagon to study encrypted enemy telecommunications which he deciphers mentally bored with his regular duties at MIT including teaching he is recruited by the mysterious William parer of the United States Department of Defense with a classified assignment to look for hidden patterns in magazines and newspapers to thwart a Soviet plot and is given an implanted diode that would give him a numeral passcode to a drop spot Nash becomes increasingly obsessive in his search for these patterns delivering his results to a secret mailbox and comes to believe he is being followed one of his students Alicia larde asks him to dinner and they fall in love on a return visit to Princeton Nash runs into Charles and his niece Marcy with Charles's encouragement he proposes to Alicia and they marry Nash fears for his life after surviving a shootout between parer and Soviet agents and learns Alisia is pregnant but he is forced to continue his assignment while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University Nash tries to flee from people he thinks are Soviet agents led by a psychiatrist named Dr Rosen but is forcibly sedated and committed to a psychiatric facility Dr Rosen tells Alicia that Nash has schizophrenia and that Charles Marcy and parer exist only in his imagination Alysia meets with sa and Bender Who show her husband's workroom which shows various news and magazines clippings and she finds the location of the secret mailbox at an abandoned mansion Alicia takes the many various unopened documents to Nash telling him that no one by the name of William parer is working in the defense department overcome with shock Nash slices his arm open to locate the diode but it is not there Nash is given a course of insulin shock therapy and eventually released frustrated with the side effects of his anti-choicers taking it and starts seeing Parcher and Charles again in 1956 Alicia discovers Nash has resumed his assignment in a shed near near their home realizing he has relapsed Alicia rushes to the house to find Nash had left their infant son in the running bathtub believing Charles was watching the baby Alicia calls Dr Rosen but Nash accidentally knocks her and the baby to the ground believing he's saving both of them from parture as Alicia flees with the baby Nash fights with his visions and realizes that all of them have looked the same ever since he first saw them he stops Alicia's car and tells her he realizes that Marcy isn't real because she has not aged since the last time he saw her finally accepting that parture and other figures are hallucinations against Dr rosen's advice Nash chooses not to undergo hospitalization again believing he can deal with his symptoms himself and Alicia decides to stay and support him Nash returns to Princeton approaching his old rival Hansen now head of the mathematics Department who allows him to work out of the library and audit classes over the next two decades Nash learns to ignore his hallucinations and by the late 1970s is allowed to teach again in 1994 Nash is awarded the Nobel Memorial prize in economic Sciences for his revolutionary work on Game Theory and is honored by his fellow professors at the ceremony he dedicates the prize to his wife as Nash Alysia and their son leave the auditorium in Stockholm Nash sees Charles Marcy and parche watching him but merely glances at them before departing cast Russell Crow as John Nash Jennifer Connelly as Alicia Nash Ed Harris as William parer Christopher Plumber as Dr Rosen Paul betany as Charles Herman Adam Goldberg as Richard Soul Josh Lucas as Martin Hansen Anthony rap as Bender Jason Grey Stanford as anley neelsen Jud HS as helinger Austin Pendleton as Thomas King Vivian Cardone as marce Herman Killian Christian and Daniel cofan creen as baby development A Beautiful Mind was the second schizophrenia themed film that Ron Howard had planned to direct the first laws of Madness would have been based on the true story of schizophrenic Michael lordo who overcame difficult odds to successfully graduate from Yale law school Howard purchased the rights to loader's life story for $1.5 million in 199 95 and had Brad Pit slated to play the lead role however after lorder killed his fiance in 1998 in the midst of a psychotic episode plans for the movie were cancelled after producer Brian graser first read an excerpt of Sylvia nassar's 1998 book A Beautiful Mind in Vanity Fair magazine he immediately purchased the rights to the film graser later said that many A-list directors were calling with their point of view on the project he eventually brought the project to Ron Howard his longtime professional partner graser met with a number of screenwriters mostly consisting of serious dramatists but he chose AKA goldsman because of his strong passion and desire for the project Goldman's creative take on the project was to avoid having viewers understand they are viewing an alternative reality until a specific point in the film this was done to rob the viewers of their understanding to mimic how Nash compr rended his experiences Howard agreed to direct the film based on the first draft he asked goldsman to emphasize the love story of Nash and his wife she was critical to his being able to continue living at home Dave berer a professor of mathematics at Barnard College Columbia University was consulted on the mathematical equations that appear in the film for the scene where Nash has to teach a Calculus class and gives them a complicated problem to keep them busy buer chose a problem physically unrealistic but mathematically very rich in keeping with Nash as someone who really doesn't want to teach the mundane details who will home in on what's really interesting berer received a cameo role in the film as a professor who lays his pen down for Nash in the pen ceremony near the end of the film Greg Canam was chosen to create the makeup effects for A Beautiful Mind specifically the age progression of the characters Crow had previously worked with Canam on The Insider Howard had also worked with Canam on cocoon each character's stages of makeup were broken down by the number of years that would pass between levels canum stressed subtlety between the stages but worked toward the ultimate stage of older Nash the production team originally decided that the makeup Department would Age Russell Crow throughout the film however at Crow's request the makeup was used to push his look to resemble the facial features of John Nash Canam developed a new silicone type makeup that could simulate skin and be used for overlapping applications this shortened makeup application time from 8 to 4 hours Crow was also fitted with a number of Dentures to give him a slight overbite in the film Howard and graser chose frequent collaborator James hoer to score the film because they knew of his ability to communicate Howard said regarding Herer it's like having a conversation with a writer or an actor or another director a running discussion between the director and the composer was the concept of highlevel mathematics being less about numbers and solutions and more akin to a kaleidoscope in that the ideas evolve and change after the first screening of the film Herer told Howard I see changes occurring like fast-moving weather systems he chose it as another theme to connect to Nash's everchanging character herner chose Welsh singer Charlotte Church to sing the soprano vocals after deciding that he needed a balance between a child and adult singing voice he wanted a purity Clarity and brightness of an instrument but also a vibrat to maintain the humanity of the voice the film was shot 90% chronologically three separate trips were made to the Princeton University campus during filming Howard decided that Nash's hallucinations should always be introduced first audibly and then visually this provides a clue for the audience and establishes the hallucinations from Nash's point of view the historic John Nash had only auditory hallucinations the filmmakers developed a technique to represent Nash's mental epiphanies mathematicians described to them such moments as a sense of the smoke clearing flashes of light and everything coming together so the filmmakers used a flash of light appearing over an object or person to signify Nash's creativity at work two night shots were done at Fairley Dickinson University's campus in florum Park New Jersey in the Vanderbilt mansion Ballroom portions of the film set at Harvard were filmed at Manhattan College Harvard has turned down most requests for onlocation filming ever since the filming of Love Story 1970 which caused significant physical damage to trees on campus Tom Cruz was considered for the lead role Howard ultimately cast Russell Crow for the role of Alicia Nash Rachel Weiss was offered the role but turned it down Charlies Theron and Julia orand auditioned for the role according to Ron Howard the four finalists for the role of Alicia were Ashley Jud Clare fani Mary McCormack and Jennifer Connelly with Connelly winning the role before the casting of Connelly Hillary Swank and Salma Hayek were also candidates for the part box office during the 5-day weekend of the Limited release A Beautiful Mind opened at the chapter 12 spot at the box office peaking at the tap 2 spot following the wide release the film went on to gross 17,745 341 flows in the United States and Canada and 313th off and 542 through $341 worldwide the Nobel Prize winner John Forbes Nash Jr still teaches at Princeton and walks to campus every day that the these commonplace statements nearly brought tears to my eyes suggest the power of a beautiful mind the story of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians and a victim of schizophrenia Nash's discoveries in Game Theory have an impact on our lives every day he also believed for a time that Russians were sending him coded messages on the front page of the New York Times A Beautiful Mind Stars Russell Crow as Nash and Jennifer Connelly as his wife Alicia who is pregnant with their child when the first symptoms of his disease become apparent it tells the story of a man whose mind was of enormous service to humanity while at the same time betrayed him with frightening delusions Crow brings the character to Life by sidest stepping sensationalism and building with small behavioral details he shows a man who descends into madness and then unexpectedly regains the ability to function in the academic world Nash has been compared to Newton mendle and Darwin but was also for many years just a man muttering to himself in the corner director Ron Howard is able to suggest a core of goodness in Nash that inspired his wife and others to stand by him to keep hope and in her words in his darkest hour to believe that something extraordinary is possible the movie's Nash begins as a quiet but cocky young man with a West Virginia accent who gradually turns into a tortured secretive paranoid who believes he is a spy being trailed by government agents Crow who has an uncanny ability to modify his look to fit a role always seems convincing as a man who ages 47 years during the film The Early Nash seen at Princeton in the late 1940s calmly tells a scholarship winner there is not a single seminal idea on either of your papers when he loses at a game of Go he explains I had the first move my play was perfect the game is flawed he is aware of his impact on others I don't much like people and they don't much like me and recalls that his first grade teacher said he was born with two helpings of brain and a half helping of heart it is Alicia who helps him find the heart she is a graduate student when they meet is attracted to his genius is touched by his loneliness is able to accept his idea of courtship when he informs her ritual requires we proceed with a number of platonic activities before we have sex to the degree that he can be touched she touches him although often he seems trapped inside himself Sylvia Nassar who wrote the 1998 biography that informs AKA Goldman's screenplay begins her book by quoting Wordsworth about a man forever voyaging through strange Seas of thought alone Nasha schizophrenia takes a literal visual form he believes he is being pursued by a federal agent Ed Harris and imagines himself in Chase scenes that seem inspired by 1940s crime movies he begins to find patterns where no patterns exist one night he and Alicia stand under the sky and he asks her to name any object and then connect stars to draw it romantic but it's not so romantic when she discovers his office thickly papered with countless bits torn from newspapers and magazines and connected by fr antic lines into imaginary patterns the movie traces his treatment by an understanding psychiatrist Christopher Plumber and his agonizing cses of insulin shock therapy medication helps him improve somewhat but only of course when he takes the medication eventually newer drugs are more effective and he begins a tentative re-entry into the academic world at Princeton the movie fascinated me about the life of this man and I sought more information finding that for many years he was a recluse wandering the campus talking to No One drinking coffee smoking cigarettes paging through piles of newspapers and magazines and then one day he paid a quite ordinary compliment to a colleague about his daughter and it was noticed that Nash seemed better there is a remarkable scene in the movie when a representative for the Nobel committee Austin Pendleton comes visiting and hints that he is being considered for the prize Nash observes that people are usually informed they have won not that they are being considered you came here to find out if I am crazy and would screw everything up if I won he did win and did not screw everything up the movies have a way of pushing mental illness into Corners it is grotesque Sensational cute funny willful tragic or perverse here it is simply a disease which renders life almost but not quite impossible for Nash and his wife before he becomes one of the lucky ones to pull out of the downward spiral when he won the Nobel Nash was asked to write about his life and he was honest enough to say his recovery is not entirely a matter of Joy he observes without his Madness zarathustra would necessarily have been only another of the millions or billions of human individuals who have lived and then been forgotten without his Madness would Nash have also lived and then been forgotten did his ability to penetrate the most difficult reaches of mathematical thought somehow come with a price attached the movie does not know and cannot say A Beautiful Mind is a 2001 American biographical drama film about the mathematician John Nash a Nobel laurate in economics played by Russell Crowe the film is directed by Ron Howard based on a screenplay by a goldsman who adapted the 1998 biography by Sylvia nassa in addition to Crow the film's cast features Ed Harris Jennifer Connelly Paul betney Adam Goldberg Jud Hirsch Josh Lucas Anthony rap and Christopher Plumber in supporting roles The Story begins in Nash's days as a brilliant but a social mathematics graduate student at Princeton University after Nash accepts secretive work in cryptography he becomes becomes liable to a larger conspiracy through which he begins to question his reality A Beautiful Mind was released theatrically in the United States on December 21st 2001 it went on to gross over 313 million worldwide and won four Academy Awards for Best Picture Best Director best adapted screenplay and best supporting actress for Conley it was also nominated for best actor best film editing best makeup and best original score plot in 1947 John Nash arrives at Princeton University as a co-recipient with Martin Hansen of the Carnegie scholarship for mathematics he meets fellow Math and Science graduate students soul anley and Bender as well as his roommate Charles Herman a literature student determined to publish his own original idea Nash is inspired when he and his classmates discuss how to approach a group of women at a bar Hansen quotes Adam Smith advocating every man for himself but Nash argues that a Cooperative approach would lead to better chances of success which leads him to develop a new concept of governing Dynamics publishing an article on his theory he earns an appointment at MIT where he chooses sa and Bender over Hansen to join him in 1953 Nash is invited to the Pentagon to study encrypted enemy Telecommunications which he deciphers mentally bored with his regular duties at MIT including teaching he is recruited by the mysterious William parer of the United States Department of Defense with a classified assignment to look for hidden patterns in magazines and newspapers to thwart a Soviet plot and is given an implanted diode that would give him a numeral passcode to a drop spot Nash becomes increasingly obsessive in his search for these patterns deliv ing his results to a secret mailbox and comes to believe he is being followed one of his students Alicia larde asks him to dinner and they fall in love on a return visit to Princeton Nash runs into Charles and his niece Marc with Charles's encouragement he proposes to Alisia and they marry Nash fears for his life after surviving a shootout between parer and Soviet agents and learns Alicia is pregnant but he is forced to continue his assignment while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University Nash tries to flee from people he thinks are Soviet agents led by a psychiatrist named Dr Rosen but is forcibly sedated and committed to a psychiatric facility Dr Rosen tells Alicia that Nash has schizophrenia and that Charles Marcy and parer exist only in his imagination Alysia meets with Saul and Bender Who show her husband's workroom which shows various news and magaz azine clippings and she finds the location of the secret mailbox at an abandoned mansion Alicia takes the many various unopened documents to Nash telling him that no one by the name of William parer is working in the defense department overcome with shock Nash slices his arm open to locate the diode but it is not there Nash is given a course of insulin shock therapy and eventually released frustrated with the side effects of his anti-choicers he secretly stops taking it and starts seeing parcha and Charles again in 1956 Alicia discovers Nash has resumed his assignment in a shed near their home realizing he has relapsed Alicia rushes to the house to find Nash had left their infant son in the running bathtub believing Charles was watching the baby Alicia calls Dr Rosen but Nash accidentally knocks her and the baby to the ground believing he's saving both of them from parture as as Alicia flees with the baby Nash fights with his visions and realizes that all of them have looked the same ever since he first saw them he stops Alicia's car and tells her he realizes that Marcy isn't real because she has not aged since the last time he saw her finally accepting that parture and other figures are hallucinations against Dr rosen's advice Nash chooses not to undergo hospitalization again believing he can deal with his symptoms himself and Alisia decides to stay and support him Nash returns to Princeton approaching his old rival Hansen now head of the mathematics Department who allows him to work out of the library and audit classes over the next two decades Nash learns to ignore his hallucinations and by the late 1970s is allowed to teach again in 1994 Nash is awarded the Nobel Memorial prize in economic Sciences for his revolutionary work on game the and is honored by his fellow professors at the ceremony he dedicates the prize to his wife as Nash Alysia and their son leave the auditorium in Stockholm Nash sees Charles Marcy and parhe watching him but merely glances at them before departing cast Russell Crow as John Nash Jennifer Connelly as Alicia Nash Ed Harris as William parer Christopher Plumber as Dr Rosen Paul betany as Charles Herman Adam Goldberg as Richard Soul Josh Lucas as Martin Hansen Anthony rap as Bender Jason Gray Stanford as Angley neelsen Jud hsh as helinger Austin Pendleton as Thomas King Vivian Cardone as marce Herman Killian Christian and Daniel cofan creen as baby development A Beautiful Mind was the second schizophrenia themed film that Ron Howard had planned to direct the first laws of Madness would have been based on the true story of schizophrenic Mich Lor who overcame difficult odds to successfully graduate from Yale law school Howard purchased the rights to Lor's life story for $1.5 million in 1995 and had Brad Pit slated to play the lead role however after Lord killed his fiance in 1998 in the midst of a psychotic episode plans for the movie were cancelled after producer Brian graser first read an excerpt of Sylvia nassar's 1998 book a beautiful in Vanity Fair magazine he immediately purchased the rights to the film graser later said that many A-list directors were calling with their point of view on the project he eventually brought the project to Ron Howard his longtime professional partner graser met with a number of screenwriters mostly consisting of serious dramatists but he chose AKA goldsman because of his strong passion and desire for the project Goldman's creative take on the project was to avoid having viewers understand they are viewing an alternative reality until a specific point in the film this was done to rob the viewers of their understanding to mimic how Nash comprehended his experiences Howard agreed to direct the film based on the first draft he asked goldsman to emphasize the love story of Nash and his wife she was critical to his being able to continue living at home Dave buer a professor of mathematics at Barnard College Columbia University was consulted on the math mathematical equations that appear in the film for the scene where Nash has to teach a Calculus class and gives them a complicated problem to keep them busy Baer chose a problem physically unrealistic but mathematically very rich in keeping with Nash as someone who really doesn't want to teach the mundane details who will home in on what's really interesting berer received a cameo role in the film as a professor who lays his pen down for Nash in the pen ceremony near the end of the film Greg Canam was chosen to create the makeup effects for A Beautiful Mind specifically the age progression of the characters Crow had previously worked with Canam on The Insider Howard had also worked with Canam on cocoon each character stages of makeup were broken down by the number of years that would pass between levels Canam stressed subtlety between the stages but work toward the ultimate stage of older Nash the production team originally decided that the makeup Department would Age Russell Crow throughout the film however at Crow's request the makeup was used to push his look to resemble the facial features of John Nash Canam developed a new silicone type makeup that could simulate skin and be used for overlapping applications this shortened makeup application time from 8 to 4 hours Crow was also fitted with a number of Dentures to give him a slight overbite in the film Howard and graser chose frequent collaborator James Herer to score the film because they knew of his ability to communicate Howard said regarding Herer it's like having a conversation with a writer or an actor or another director a running discussion between the director and the composer was the concept of highlevel mathematics being less about numbers and solutions and more akin to a kaleidoscope in that the ideas evolve and change after the first screening of the film Herer told Howard I see changes occuring like fast moving weather systems he chose it as another theme to connect to Nash's everchanging character Herer chose Welsh singer Charlotte Church to sing the soprano vocals after deciding that he needed a balance between a child and adult singing voice he wanted a purity Clarity and brightness of an instrument but also a vibrat to maintain the humanity of the voice the film was shot 90% chronologically three separate trips were made to the the Princeton University campus during filming Howard decided that Nash's hallucinations should always be introduced first audibly and then visually this provides a clue for the audience and establishes the hallucinations from Nash's point of view the historic John Nash had only auditory hallucinations the filmmakers developed a technique to represent Nash's mental epiphanies mathematicians describe to them such moments as a sense of the smoke clearing flashes of light and everything coming together so the filmmakers used a flash of light appearing over an object or person to signify Nash's creativity at work two night shots were done at Fairley Dickinson University's campus in florum Park New Jersey in the Vanderbilt mansion Ballroom portions of the film set at Harvard were filmed at Manhattan College Harvard has turned down most requests for onlocation filming ever since the filming of Love Story 19 7 which caused significant physical damage to trees on campus Tom Cruz was considered for the lead role Howard ultimately cast Russell Crow for the role of Alicia Nash Rachel Weiss was offered the role but turned it down Charlies Theron and Julia orand auditioned for the role according to Ron Howard the four finalists for the role of Alicia were Ashley Jud CLA fani Mary McCormack and Jennifer Connelly with Connelly winning the role before the casting of Connelly Hillary Swank and Salma hyek were also candidates for the part box office during the 5-day weekend of the limited release A Beautiful Mind opened at the chapter 12 spot at the box office peaking at the tap2 spot following the wide release the film went on to gross 17,745 341 PLS in the United States and Canada and 33,42 the $341 worldwide the Nobel Prize winner John Forbes Nash Jr still teaches at Princeton and walks to campus every day that these commonplace statements nearly brought tears to my eyes suggest the power of a beautiful mind the story of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians and a victim of schizophrenia Nash's discoveries in Game Theory have an impact on our lives every day he also believed for a time that Russia were sending him coded messages on the front page of the New York Times A Beautiful Mind Stars Russell Crow as Nash and Jennifer Connelly as his wife Alicia who is pregnant with their child when the first symptoms of his disease become apparent it tells the story of a man whose mind was of enormous service to humanity while at the same time betrayed him with frightening delusions Crow brings the character to Life by sidest stepping sensationalism and building with small Behavior details he shows a man who descends into madness and then unexpectedly regains the ability to function in the academic world Nash has been compared to Newton mendle and Darwin but was also for many years just a man muttering to himself in the corner director Ron Howard is able to suggest a core of goodness in Nash that inspired his wife and others to stand by him to keep hope and in her words in his darkest hour to believe that something extraordinary is possible possible the movie's Nash begins as a quiet but cocky young man with a West Virginia accent who gradually turns into a tortured secretive paranoid who believes he is a spy being trailed by government agents Crow who has an uncanny ability to modify his look to fit a role always seems convincing as a man who ages 47 years during the film The Early Nash seen at Princeton in the late 1940s calmly tells a scholarship winner there is not a single seal idea on either of your papers when he loses at a game of Go he explains I had the first move my play was perfect the game is flawed he is aware of his impact on others I don't much like people and they don't much like me and recalls that his first grade teacher said he was born with two helpings of brain and a half helping of heart it is Alicia who helps him find the heart she is a graduate student when they meet is is attracted to his genius is touched by his loneliness is able to accept his idea of courtship when he informs her ritual requires we proceed with a number of platonic activities before we have sex to the degree that he can be touched she touches him although often he seems trapped inside himself Sylvia Nassar who wrote the 1998 biography that informs AKA Goldman's screenplay begins her book by quoting Wordsworth about a man forever voyaging through strange Seas of thought alone Nas's schizophrenia takes a literal visual form he believes he is being pursued by a federal agent Ed Harris and imagines himself in Chase scenes that seem inspired by 1940s crime movies he begins to find patterns where no patterns exist one night he and Alisia stand under the sky and he asks her to name any object and then connects stars to draw it romantic but it's not so romantic when she discovers his office thickly papered with countless bits torn from newspapers and magazines and connected by frantic lines into imaginary patterns the movie traces his treatment by an understanding psychiatrist Christopher Plumber and his agonizing courses of insulin shock therapy medication helps him improve somewhat but only of course when he takes the medication eventually newer drug are more effective and he begins a tentative re-entry into the academic world at Princeton the movie fascinated me about the life of this man and I sought more information finding that for many years he was a recluse wandering the campus talking to No One drinking coffee smoking cigarettes paging through piles of newspapers and magazines and then one day he paid a quite ordinary compliment to a colleague about his daughter and it was noticed that Nash seemed better there is a remarkable scene in the movie when a representative for the Nobel committee Austin Pendleton comes visiting and hints that he is being considered for the prize Nash observes that people are usually informed they have won not that they are being considered you came here to find out if I am crazy and would screw everything up if I won he did win and did not screw everything up the movies have a way of pushing mental illness into corners it is grotesque Sensational cute funny willful tragic or perverse here it is simply a disease which renders life almost but not quite impossible for Nash and his wife before he becomes one of the lucky ones to pull out of the downward spiral when he won the Nobel Nash was asked to write about his life and he was honest enough to say his recovery is not entirely a matter of Joy he observes without his Madness zarathustra would necessarily have been only another of the millions or billions of human individuals who have lived and then been forgotten without his Madness would Nash have also lived and then been forgotten did his ability to penetrate the most difficult reaches of mathematical thought somehow come with a price attached the movie does not know and cannot say A Beautiful Mind is a 2001 American biographical drama film about the mathematician John Nash a Nobel laurate in economics played by Russell Crow the film is directed by Ron Howard based on a screenplay by AKA goldsman who adapted the 1998 biography by Sylvia nassa in addition to Crow the film's cast features Ed Harris Jennifer Connelly Paul betney Adam Goldberg Jud H Josh Lucas Anthony rap and Christopher Plumber in supporting roles the Story begins in Nash's days as a brilliant but a social mathematics graduate student at Princeton University after Nash accepts secretive work in cryptography he becomes liable to a larger conspiracy through which he begins to question his reality A Beautiful Mind was released theatrically in the United States on December 21st 2001 it went on to gross over 3133 million worldwide and won four Academy Awards for Best Picture Best Director best adapted screenplay and best supporting actress for Connelly it was also nominated for best actor best film editing best makeup and best original score plot in 1947 John Nash arrives at Princeton University as a co-recipient with Martin Hansen of the Carnegie scholarship for mathematics he meets fellow Math and Science graduate students soul anley and Bender as well as well as his roommate Charles Herman a literature student determined to publish his own original idea Nash is inspired when he and his classmates discuss how to approach a group of women at a bar Hansen quotes Adam Smith advocating every man for himself but Nash argues that a Cooperative approach would lead to better chances of success which leads him to develop a new concept of governing Dynamics publishing an article on his theory he earns an appointment at MIT te where he chooses Saul and Bender over Hansen to join him in 1953 Nash is invited to the Pentagon to study encrypted enemy telecommunications which he deciphers mentally bored with his regular duties at MIT including teaching he is recruited by the mysterious William parer of the United States Department of Defense with a classified assignment to look for hidden patterns in magazines and newspapers to thwart a Soviet plot and is given an implanted diode that would give him a numeral passcode to a drop spot Nash becomes increasingly obsessive in his search for these patterns delivering his results to a secret mailbox and comes to believe he is being followed one of his students Alicia larde asks him to dinner and they fall in love on a return visit to Princeton Nash runs into Charles and his niece Marc with Charles's encouragement he proposes to Alicia and they marry Nash fears for his life after surviving a shootout between parer and Soviet agents and learns Alisia is pregnant but he is forced to continue his assignment while delivering a guest lecture at Harvard University Nash tries to flee from people he thinks are Soviet agents led by a psychiatrist named Dr Rosen but is forcibly sedated and committed to a psychiatric facility Dr Rosen tells Alicia that Nash has schizophrenia and that Charles Marcy and parer exist only in his imagination Alysia meets with Saul and Bender Who show her husband's workroom which shows various news and magazines clippings and she finds the location of the secret mailbox at an abandoned mansion Alysia takes the many various unopened documents to Nash telling him that no one by the name of William parer is working in the defense department overcome with shock Nash slices his arm open to locate the D OD but it is not there Nash is given a course of insulin shock therapy and eventually released frustrated with the side effects of his antipsychotic medication he secretly stops taking it and starts seeing parer and Charles again in 1956 Alicia discovers Nash has resumed his assignment in a shed near their home realizing he has relapsed Alicia rushes to the house to find Nash had left their infant son in the running bathtub believing Charles was watching the baby Alicia calls Dr Rosen but Nash accidentally knocks her and the baby to the ground believing he's saving both of them from parture as Alicia flees with the baby Nash fights with his visions and realizes that all of them have looked the same ever since he first saw them he stops Alicia's car and tells her he realizes that Mary isn't real because she has not aged since the last time he saw her finally accepting that parer and other fig are hallucinations against Dr rosen's advice Nash chooses not to undergo hospitalization again believing he can deal with his symptoms himself and Alisia decides to stay and support him Nash returns to Princeton approaching his old rival Hansen now head of the mathematics Department who allows him to work out of the library and audit classes over the next two decades Nash learns to ignore his hallucinations and by the late 1970s is allowed to teach again in 1994 Nash is awarded the Nobel Memorial prize in economic Sciences for his revolutionary work on Game Theory and is honored by his fellow professors at the ceremony he dedicates the prize to his wife as Nash Alysia and their son leave the auditorium in Stockholm Nash sees Charles Marcy and parhe watching him but merely glances at them before departing cast Russell Crow as John Nash Jennifer Connelly as Alicia Nash Ed Harris as William parer Christopher Plumber as Dr Rosen Paul betany as Charles Herman Adam Goldberg as Richard Soul Josh Lucas as Martin Hansen Anthony rap as Bender Jason Gray Stanford as Angley neelsen Jud HH as helinger Austin Pendleton as Thomas King Vivian Cardone as marce Herman Killian Christian and Daniel cofan creen as baby development a Beautiful Mind was the second schizophrenia themed film that Ron Howard had planned to direct the first laws of Madness would have been based on the true story of schizophrenic Michael lordo who overcame difficult odds to successfully graduate from Yale law school Howard purchased the rights to L's life story for $1.5 million in 1995 and had Brad Pit slated to play the lead role however after lorder killed his fiance in 1998 in the midst of a psych IC episode plans for the movie were cancelled after producer Brian graser first read an excerpt of Sylvia nassar's 1998 book A Beautiful Mind in Vanity Fair magazine he immediately purchased the rights to the film graser later said that many A-list directors were calling with their point of view on the project he eventually brought the project to Ron Howard his longtime professional partner graser met with a number of screenwriters mostly consisting of serious dramatists but he chose AKA goldsman because of his strong passion and desire for the project Goldman's creative take on the project was to avoid having viewers understand they are viewing an alternative reality until a specific point in the film this was done to rob the viewers of their understanding to mimic how Nash comprehended his experiences Howard agreed to direct the film based on the first draft he asked goldsman to emphasize the love story of Nash and his wife she was critical to his being able to continue living at home Dave berer a professor of mathematics at Barnard college Colombia University was consulted on the mathematical equations that appear in the film for the scene where Nash has to teach a Calculus class and gives them a complicated problem to keep them busy buer chose a problem physically unrealistic but mathematically very rich in keeping with Nash as someone who really doesn't want to teach the mundane details who will home in on what's really interesting berer received a cameo role in the film as a professor who lays his pen down for Nash in the pen ceremony near the end of the film Greg Canam was chosen to create the makeup effects for A Beautiful Mind specifically the age progression of the characters Crow had previously worked with Canam on The Insider Howard had also worked with Canam on cocoon each character's stages of makeup were broken down by the number of years that would pass pass between levels Canam stressed subtlety between the stages but worked toward the ultimate stage of older Nash the production team originally decided that the makeup Department would Age Russell Crow throughout the film however at Crow's request the makeup was used to push his look to resemble the facial features of John Nash Canam developed a new silicone type makeup that could simulate skin and be used for overlapping applications this shortened makeup application time from 8 to 4 hours Crow was also fitted with a number of Dentures to give him a slight overbite in the film Howard and graser chose frequent collaborator James Herer to score the film because they knew of his ability to communicate Howard said regarding horer it's like having a conversation with a writer or an actor or another director a running discussion between the director and the composer was the concept of highlevel mathematics being less about numbers and Sol Solutions and more akin to a kaleidoscope in that the ideas evolve and change after the first screening of the film Herer told Howard I see changes occurring like fast moving weather systems he chose it as another theme to connect to Nash's everchanging character Herer chose Welsh singer Charlotte Church to sing the soprano vocals after deciding that he needed a balance between a child and adult singing voice he wanted a purity Clarity and brightness of an instrument but also a vibrat to maintain the humanity of the voice the film was shot 90% chronologically three separate trips were made to the Princeton University campus during filming Howard decided that Nash's hallucinations should always be introduced first audibly and then visually this provides a clue for the audience and establishes the hallucinations from Nash's point of view the historic John Nash had only auditory hallucination ations the filmmakers developed a technique to represent Nash's mental epiphanies mathematicians described to them such moments as a sense of the smoke clearing flashes of light and everything coming together so the filmmakers used a flash of light appearing over an object or person to signify Nash's creativity at work two night shots were done at Fairley Dickinson University's campus in florum Park New Jersey in the Vanderbilt mansion Ballroom portions of the film set at Harvard were filmed at Manhattan College Harvard has turned down most requests for onlocation filming ever since the filming of Love Story 1970 which caused significant physical damage to trees on campus Tom Cruz was considered for the lead role Howard ultimately cast Russell Crow for the role of Alicia Nash Rachel Weiss was offered the role but turned it down chares Theron and Julia orand auditioned for the role according to Ron Howard the four finalists for the role of Alicia were Ashley Jud CLA fani Mary McCormack and Jennifer Connelly with Connelly winning the role before the casting of Connelly Hillary Swank and Salma hyek were also candidates for the part box office during the 5-day weekend of the limited release A Beautiful Mind opened at the chapter 12 spot at the box office peing at the D two spot following the wide release the film went on on to gross 17,745 341 LS in the United States and Canada and 33542 through $341 worldwide the Nobel Prize winner John Forbes Nash Jr still teaches at Princeton and walks to campus every day that these commonplace statements nearly brought tears to my eyes suggest the power of a beautiful mind the story of a man who is one of the greatest mathematicians and a victim of schizophrenia Nash's discoveries in Game Theory have an impact on our lives every day he also believed for a time that Russians were sending him coded messages on the front page of the New York Times A Beautiful Mind Stars Russell Crow as Nash and Jennifer Connelly as his wife Alicia who is pregnant with their child when the first symptoms of his disease become apparent it tells the story of a man whose mind was of enormous service to humanity while at the same time betrayed him with frightening delusions Crow brings the character to Life by sidest stepping sensationalism and building with small behavioral details he shows a man who descends into madness and then unexpectedly regains the ability to function in the academic world Nash has been compared to Newton mendle and Darwin but was also for many years just a man muttering to himself in the corner director Ron Howard is able to suggest a core of goodness in Nash that inspired his wife and others to stand by him to keep hope and in her words in his darkest hour to believe that something extraordinary is possible the movie's Nash begins as a quiet but cocky young man with a West Virginia accent who gradually turns into a tortured secretive paranoid who believes he is a spy being trailed by government agents Crow who has an uncanny ability to modify his look to fit a role always seems convincing as a man who ages 47 years during the film The Early Nash seen at Princeton in the late 1940s calmly tells a scholarship winner there is not a single seminal idea on either of your papers when he loses at a game of Go he explains I had the first move my play was perfect the game is flawed he is aware of his impact on others I don't much like people and they don't much like me and recalls that his first grade teacher said he was born with two helpings of brain and a half helping of heart it is Alicia who helps him find the heart she is a graduate student when they meet is attracted to his genius is touched by his loneliness is able to accept his idea of courtship when he informs her ritual requires we proceed with a number of platonic activities before we have sex to the degree that he can be touched she touches him although often he seems trapped inside him himself Sylvia Nassar who wrote the 1998 biography that informs AKA Goldman's screenplay begins her book by quoting Wordsworth about a man forever voyaging through strange Seas of thought alone Nasha schizophrenia takes a literal visual form he believes he is being pursued by a federal agent Ed Harris and imagines himself in Chase scenes that seem inspired by 1940s crime movies he begins to find patterns where no patterns exist one night he and Alicia stand under the sky and he asks her to name any object and then connect stars to draw it romantic but it's not so romantic when she discovers his office thickly papered with countless bits torn from newspapers and magazines and connected by frantic lines into imaginary patterns the movie traces his treatment by an understanding psychiatrist Christopher Plumber and his is agonizing courses of insulin shock therapy medication helps him improve somewhat but only of course when he takes the medication eventually newer drugs are more effective and he begins a tentative re-entry into the academic world at Princeton the movie fascinated me about the life of this man and I sought more information finding that for many years he was a recluse wandering the campus talking to No One drinking coffee smoking cigarettes paging through piles of newspapers and magazines and then one day he paid a quite ordinary compliment to a colleague about his daughter and it was noticed that Nash seemed better there is a remarkable scene in the movie when a representative for the Nobel committee Austin Pendleton comes visiting and hints that he is being considered for the prize Nash observes that people are usually informed they have won not that they are being considered you came here to find out if I am crazy and would screw everything up if I won he did win and did not screw everything up the movies have a way of pushing mental illness into Corners it is grotesque Sensational cute funny willful tragic or perverse here it is simply a disease which renders life almost but not quite impossible for Nash and his wife before he becomes one of the lucky ones to pull out of the downward spiral when he won the Nobel Nash was asked to write about his life and he was honest enough to say his recovery is not entirely a matter of Joy he observes without his Madness zarathustra would necessarily have been only another of the millions or billions of human individuals who have lived and then been forgotten without his Madness would Nash have also lived and then been forgotten did his ability to penetrate the most difficult reaches of mathematical thought somehow come with a price attached the movie does not know and cannot say