A Celebration of Life

Rating: 10/10 (28 March 2002)

Empiricists are prone to simply place a label on something that cannot be quantified or qualified by sense perception and then to construct a mythology around it. This is the case in the science of human behavior. Abnormal behavior that is not understood, such as schizophrenia is labeled and categorized per its attending syndrome. Its symtomology is then attacked by various therapeutic methods and chemical concoctions, some which are more harmful to the patient than the so-called illness itself.
In this exquisite film the protagonist suffers from schizophrenia as diagnosed by a psychiatrist. Yet, the film is not about the illness as much as it is about an extraordinary man who is quite different from most of us, a man who has far greater use of his brain than perhaps 99.9% of the rest of us. It is about his triumph despite the "malady".
However, this malady, as seen by some metaphysicians takes on a more interesting casting. After Albert Einstein the entire world we thought we knew came up for grabs. In this new arena where temporal reality is invalidated and matter revealed as pure energy, where time and space are inextricably bonded and labeled illusory the astute metaphysician has no alternative but to see some abnormal behaviors as perhaps something far more profound than a dysfunction of the brain.
As seen here, in this very best work thus far of Ron Howard after a director's career of excellence we are given the latitude to question the nature of the "illness" called schizophrenia. We are also shown interweaving realities as perceived by an extraordinary mind and what happens when that mind meets the rest of us.