Barnes & Noble

Based on Sylvia Nasar’s bestselling biography of John Forbes Nash Jr., the MIT mathematician who successfully conquered mental illness and went on to win a Nobel Prize, A Beautiful Mind is a gripping melodrama with a whopper of a Sixth Sense-style twist. We first meet Nash, played by Russell Crowe, in 1947, when he is still a brilliant but highly eccentric and socially awkward mathematics student at Princeton. His remarkable work on game theory eventually lands him a position at MIT, where he meets both his wife, Alicia (Jennifer Connelly), and a sinister CIA agent (Ed Harris) who recruits him as a code breaker for the Defense Department. Director Ron Howard, who employs some clever narrative devices that allow the audience to see the world from Nash’s perspective, shows how Cold War paranoia feeds and shapes his developing schizophrenia. The depiction of Nash’s battle to banish his voices -- not through debilitating drugs but by simply refusing to listen to them -- poignantly conveys the sadness and isolation of mental illness. Crowe is as compelling as ever, but it is Connelly who is the real revelation here. Her Oscar-winning turn as the gorgeous young wife who stands by Nash through it all, weathering violent episodes and medication-induced impotence, is touching and impressively grounded. The truth of Nash’s life is, at least as revealed in Nasar's book, less tidy than what we see on screen. Howard and Oscar-winning screenwriter Akiva Goldsman excised all sorts of unsavory details, and the result is Hollywood myth making at its most unabashed (complete with a heavy-handed score that telegraphs every emotion). Yet, there is no denying the emotional and inspirational power that earned A Beautiful Mind Oscars for both Best Picture and Best Director: It is an inspiring portrait of a gifted man, an extraordinary woman, and a remarkable triumph. Ed Hulse

All Movie Guide

The true story of prominent mathematician John Forbes Nash Jr. is the subject of this biographical drama from director Ron Howard. Russell Crowe stars as the brilliant but arrogant and conceited professor Nash. The prof seems guaranteed a rosy future in the early '50s after he marries beautiful student Alicia (Jennifer Connelly) and makes a remarkable advancement in the foundations of "game theory," which carries him to the brink of international acclaim. Soon after, John is visited by Agent William Parcher (Ed Harris), from the CIA, who wants to recruit him for code-breaking activities. But evidence suggests that Nash's perceptions of reality are cloudy at best; he is struggling to maintain his tenuous hold on sanity, and Alicia suspects a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. Battling decades of illness with the loyal Alicia by his side, Nash is ultimately able to gain some control over his mental state, and eventually goes on to triumphantly win the Nobel Prize. Based loosely on the book of the same name by Sylvia Nasar, A Beautiful Mind (2001) co-stars Paul Bettany, Adam Goldberg, Anthony Rapp, Christopher Plummer, and Judd Hirsch. Karl Williams

Entertainment Weekly

Russell Crowe sometimes summons up one of the most powerful depictions of mental illness I have ever seen with barely an eyelid flicker separating manifestations of sickness from utterly sane displays of creative concentration. Lisa Schwarzbaum

Village Voice

The movie illustrates with poignant (if reductive) clarity the awful no-exit paradox of a paranoid delusion -- that its most incapacitating aspect is its terrifying realness. Dennis Lim

New York Post

1/2
Terrific, surprisingly gripping true-life tale of a math genius battling madness. Jonathan Foreman

USA Today

1/2
Among the most affecting ever made about co-existing with mental demons. Mike Clark

Product Details

• UPC: 025192145025
• Source: UNIVERSAL STUDIOS
• Region Code: 1
• Aspect Ratio: Theatre Wide-Screen (1.85.1)
• Presentation: Wide Screen
• Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
• Language: English, Français
• Subtitles: English, Español
• Time: 2:16:00

This DVD is also available as part of a box set:

• Ron Howard Spotlight Collection

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