A Beautiful Mind

A Beautiful Mind

This was a superb movie although it was not original from the standpoint of being the first movie about schizophrenia, it was first the time I have seen this sickness manifest itself like that. The movie was based on a true story is about a brilliant mathematician John Nash, who was suffering from a very severe case of schizophrenia for many years un-noticed, it begun in his teenage years. He believed that he was secretly working the government breaking Russian codes, and how the situation got out of control. It also illustrates the agony of coming to terms will the illness both for him and even his wife. Through her love and commitment for him he recovered but this seemed short lived, his 'reality' may have been too real for too long to let go.

I believe more than anything else, this movie focuses on perceptions of life. Perception of what is reality and what is imaginary, not only his perception but also people's perception of him, and of the situation. Yet he was a brilliant man, although at times to people he seemed a bit unorthodox he was eventually accepted. Ironically enough I believe that it was his problems of not liking people, but wanting to be accepted and acknowledge that aided his mental state, however by the time he had become accepted his imaginary world was out of control.

His wife was also very instrumental in his life; the picture shows how she took so many things for granted, the man that she knew as her husband again, her perception was blown out of the water. It also demonstrated her love and commitment to this man that she thought she knew, and how she had to come to terms with her reality of who he was, and being able to still support him regardless of her reasons. Because he initially had a problem communicating with people, he created a comfort zone in his roommate, this was the beginning of the end, with respect to what was real and what was fiction.

The most important evidence in this movie suggests just how real these characters were to John, I'm sure none of the viewers without any prior knowledge of the film, would have known that these so called people were all imaginary. But what was reality for John? When looking back at the movie I realized that these people never spoke to anyone else only John, the prodigal roommate that was a bit more adventurous the John was what John wished he might be. When he needed someone to talk to about his wife to be, he called on his roommate again years later.

And lets not forget when he began to get anxious in his work, but he was feeling left out of the loop, in whatever little work he may have done for the government so he invented Mr. Parcher, the government agent. This would explain his secrecy for maybe so how he knew they weren't ALL real. What started as a safe zone in his mind became out of control when Mr. Parcher turned to violence, and then when they held him and revealed to him his folly, he simple cracked.

Another interesting aspect was how through taking medication,