Overrated, standard fare.

Rating: 5/10 (24 March 2002)

Ron Howard's A Beautiful Mind, which I just witnessed win Best Picture, is middle-brow, typical fare. It is most definitely not Howard's best work (that would be Apollo 13, in my opinion). While Jennifer Connelly gives an excellent performance, Russell Crowe has been a lot better. Yet this is the kind of performance people often fall for, giving credit to the role's challenges than to the actual connection we have to the actor. Yes, Crowe is techincally excellent (although his accent slides a little). But is it a performance that inspires us or reflects ourselves? I think not. Crowe's performance was nowhere near the level of Tom Wilkinson in In The Bedroom.
There are some pluses to the film: The aforementioned solid acting, a genuine attempt to put into cinematic terms the mind-boggling (pardon the pun) disease of schizophrenia (which someone in my own family suffers from). Although the film has been attacked by those who say that Nash's life hasn't been put into accurate context, my question is: who cares? You don't seen biopics for hard facts unless you are a fool. Just look at Nixon, Raging Bull, and others. As long as the film itself is effective in portraying its character, that's all that matters. A Beautiful Mind also contains some great moments. My favourite is when Jennifer Connelly lets out one instant of frustration, smashing the glass in the bathroom. It is so shocking and emerges from such quiet that the effect is quite profound.
But the problems outweigh the strengths. Some complaints:
1. The musical score is atrocious. I can't believe it was nominated for an Oscar. It is saccharine, violin-heavy, tearjerking and shameless.
2. The disease of schizophrenia is grossly simplified. The fact that Crowe has these three characters who are so clearly obvious in what aspect of his psyche that they represent is a cheap trick.
3. The second half of the film becomes grossly repetitive. We see Crowe walking, we see his POV of either Big Brother or his roommate or the little girl, and then he continues on in the face of his disease. There were about SEVEN scenes like this. I was growing bored...
4. There are too many Hollywood moments. The little musical chord that strikes when we first see an aged Crowe and Connelly (Oh...how touching...they're still together after all of these years). And worse is the episode with a beautiful woman that inspires Crowe to come up with his mathematic theory.
5. The mathematic theory isn't explained in nearly enough detail. We are only told that Nash's work "changed modern economics". Howard doesn't trust that the audience has the patience or the intelligence to be told how.
6. Back to the Hollywood moments. I hate it in movies when we see something happen to a character in their twenties, and then this resonates while they are in their sixties. We have just seen these things happen a few hours ago. They happened a lifetime ago for the characters. I know we remember some things forever, but A Beautiful Mind really stretched this effect. Examples: the hankerchief that Alicia gives John, the phrase "petrified, stupified, etc." that John mocks his friend/adversary with when offered to play a game, and the full-circle effect of John receiving all the pens in that special room where he had once been snubbed. (How touching...pass the hankerchief). John may have been so deeply imprinted with rejection when he saw another man receiving the tribute, so it is possible that this would still have some resonance. But the hankerchief is a typical Howardian Hollywood ploy. And are we really supposed to believe that John remembers the exact order of words that he said to a man who offered to play a game with him FORTY-SEVEN YEARS AGO!!!! Give me a break.
I am not a cynic who doesn't like feel-good movies. But the movies have to earn it, and A Beautiful Mind did not. There are too many flaws in this picture to recommend it. Rather, I would give it about a 60/100. This continues a poor and long stretch of mistakes by the Academy in handing out the Best Picture (excluding Schindler's List and American Beauty). Of the last TWELVE Best Picture winners, I have only really enjoyed four: the aforementioned Schindler's List and American Beauty (my two favourite films of all-time), Unforgiven and Forrest Gump. Is something wrong with me? Or is it the Academy? Obviously, you know what I think.