nice acting, poor film

Rating: 3/10 (9 March 2013)

i thought Jennifer Lawrence did a great job. to me she was charismatic and believable. i thought Bradley cooper's portrayal of hypomania worked. bipolar illness comes in many forms; this is one. that said, so many aspects of the film were way off. i will admit to the bias of reading the book and loving it. but i don't mind that the book was changed - for example, changing the man's affliction from traumatic brain injury to bipolar illness works well. but so many small details that work in the book are changed arbitrarily to forms that make no sense:
1) the title. in the book, his hospitalization taught him that he lost his marriage because he was neglectful and inconsiderate. he has resolved to be "kind instead of right," and hopes that being a better man can win his wife back; that is the "silver lining" beneath the cloud of his injury. in the movie, he comes out of the hospital angry and inconsiderate, so the title makes no sense.
2) like another reviewer, my jaw dropped to hear trazodone (rhymes with hazard) pronounced to rhyme with lake. if you know of the med, it's as impossible as if they had pronounced Valium, "vaylium, " or Robert de Niro, "de-ny-ro."
3) the dad as a kindly bookmaker. in the novel, the dad is unavailable and surly. though i understand the director, as the father of a bipolar son, wanting to show dads in a positive light, the bookmaker addition makes no sense at all. he has no customers that we can see. he makes unwise bets.
4) the brother is a decent fellow in the book, has a job, family, tries to be helpful. in the movie, he's an a$$hole for no good reason.
5) in the book, the therapist is kind, wise, humane. in the movie, he is simplistic -"you have to have a plan" - ineffectual, and irrelevant. plus he seems to be hearing everything that has happened in our hero's life before the session. where on earth does he get this information!?!? totally unrealistic.
6) the eagles: in the book, the friend, brother, and hero have a long history of loving the eagles. it is part of the hero's community. and we root for the eagles along with them. in the movie, there is no development of this community. the eagles are just something to bet on (and, again, the betting makes no sense). in the book, there's a fight with a belligerent giant's fan. in the movie this is changed - why? - to racist eagles fans attacking south Asian fans.
6) the police officer (not in the book). omg! as another poster has said, where on earth do you get your own personal cop to watch out for you when you get out of the hospital?
7) the ex-wife. in the book, she has pressed charges that put him away for years, served a restraining order, written him off and moved on. in the movie, she first comes to the dance performance and then shows no reaction when he whispers in her ear - what? - that he is now in love with someone else? a terrible scene that is completely inconsistent with the set-up of her character.
8) medication. in the book, he decides to start taking the meds, and they help. in the movie, maybe he takes his meds, but it's quite unclear.
9) terrible camera work. shaky, out-of-focus, nausea-inducing.