A Beautiful Mind

A biopic that got put through the Hollywood Play-Doh Fun Factory of Biography Movies, manufacturing drama when real life had more than enough to it. I'm not a big fan of the glib "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" way it views schizoaffective disorder, as if it's something you can push through on sheer will power alone. I would say it's not even the best picture released in 2001 that deals with mental health (Prozac Nation is a much more realistic and honest movie). Using the cast as college students is also a little much, when nobody is confusing any of them for 21 year olds. Beyond that, it's a boilerplate Hollywood biopic. Good acting, a narrative that's been massaged more than a PT patient, and Ron Howard's direction is what it always is.