Grade:  A

Director:  Ron Howard		Released:  December 2001
Writer:  Akiva Goldsman, from Sylvia Nasar's book		MPAA Rating:  PG-13
Players:  Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly		Running time:  135 minutes

Ratings System

In my opinion, A Beautiful Mind makes a number of current movies look bad by comparison.  Ali for one, didn't do nearly as good a job in terms of biography; informing us about someone's life.  A Beautiful Mind follows John Nash through much of adulthood; Ali follows Muhammed Ali for maybe a decade.  A Beautiful Mind takes us into the inner sanctum of John Nash, and shows us his fears, his successes, and his struggles; Ali shows us some fighting and some training, and some problems with the government, all of which we already knew.  A Beautiful Mind is thought provoking and intelligent; Ali is hollow.  Vanilla Sky is another film that looks terrible when compared to A Beautiful Mind.  For more on that topic read my review for Vanilla Sky here.

I have a college degree in Psychology, and certain scenes in this movie brought memories flooding back from some of my courses.  Being a patient with a mental disorder in the 1950's was below average for the patient.  This was an era of shock therapy, insulin, straight jackets and isolation.  Some of the practices from that time period are now considered archaic and downright brutal.  And in more than one scene, this movie shows us how traumatic it was.

So don't be fooled by the trailers, this is not a movie about government spies, or some kind of matured Good Will Hunting.  This is a serious movie about a serious topic and a serious man.  It may be the best movie I've seen for 2001.

- crocoPuffs