A Beautiful Mind Reviews
It isn't the device that's so crude, but the execution, which turns Nash's persecutory demons into nuisances that won't leave us alone.
Crowe pulls out the stops, but he looks too bullish and controlled for such a pitiable victim.
The result is mainstream moviemaking at its highest, most satisfying level.
Consistently engrossing as an unusual character study and as a trip to the mysterious border-crossing between rarified brilliance and madness.
Director Ron Howard's deftness in suggesting the subjective experience of Crowe's character, who's later diagnosed with schizophrenia, makes for inspirational narrative, but certain plot points are so reductive.
Time Out
Top CriticAt its most effective when it seems to lose the plot in a scrambled second act that posits the Cold War as a collective paranoid delusion, the film reverts to type (and to fact) for a sentimental anti-climax.
A light veneer of condescension hangs over A Beautiful Mind.
It makes you understand what it feels like to have a serious breakdown in powerful, empathetic ways that no movie has ever done before.
| Original Score: 4/5
Nash's subterranean nightmare takes on the gripping elements of a psychological thriller.
You can't believe Russell Crowe is the same actor who won an Oscar one year ago for Gladiator. The film has a reveal so startling I almost got whiplash, shaking my head in amazement.
As bold and searingly imaginative as it is substantive.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/4
[Howard's] most accomplished, most mature and least-compromised movie, 'Oscar-worthy' in every way.
Crowe and Connelly's work rises above the mush.
| Original Score: 3/4
Like a good college education itself, A Beautiful Mind broadens your perspective on life.
You can practically feel director Ron Howard standing over your tear ducts, straining to extract every last salty drop.
Howard gives Crowe the space he needs to build a memorable character.
Despite a shaky West Virginia accent, Crowe does exemplary work here, his best since The Insider.
Tells us little about paranoid schizophrenia, less about genius, and next to nothing about Nash.
It too neatly pigeonholes the complexities of the dramatic situation, but the performances carry the show.
Since love conquers all, you know everything will turn out okay. It's practically a mathematical formula.
Roger Deakins' handsome cinematography gives the film the look of a leather-bound classic.
Nicely filmed by Roger Deakins and magnificently performed by Crowe, who never fails to surprise.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/4
Sadly, Howard blands out in the final third, using old-age makeup and tear-jerking to turn a tough true story into something easily digestible. Until then, you'll be riveted.
| Original Score: 4.5/5
Humanistic and engaging piece of popular entertainment.
Terrific, surprisingly gripping true-life tale of a math genius battling madness.
| Original Score: 4/4
In the hands of a better director than Ron Howard, such a protean mix of reason and madness could have made for a tale of Shakespearean complexity. Instead, all we get is a feel-good flick.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
Despite the 'Hollywoodization' of Nash's personal life, A Beautiful Mind is a thoughtful, provocative film about human frailties and human strength.
The movie fascinated me about the life of this man.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/4
One of Hollywood's very few really classy or ambitious offerings this year.
| Original Score: 3.5/4
There is more to admire in A Beautiful Mind than you might suspect, but less than its creators believe.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
The biggest load of hooey to stink up the screen this year.
Among the most affecting ever made about co-existing with mental demons.
The movie can -- indeed, should -- be intellectually rejected, but you can't quite banish it from your mind.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
One of those formulaically rendered Important Subject movies.
| Original Score: 2.5/5
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.
Full Review
| Original Score: B+
Shows us the joys and terrors of seeing things that others can't.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/4
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.
Screenwriter Akiva Goldsman has fashioned a powerful narrative that's brought to life by the outstanding cast and Howard's assured direction.
A beautifully written, effectively acted, and meticulously crafted effort.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/4
Practically a one-man show, but Russell Crowe makes it an entertaining one.
