yet another movie to add to my grudging admiration list: a beautiful mind. caitlin, andrea and i lunched at the good croissant’en (gucci sandwich shop) and made our way — via DIS to check for my dawdling package and buy beverages, and Tiger, the funky dollar-store equivalent — to Palads, the circus-colored multi-screen movie theater. we hemmed and hawed over our options and settled, although the selection made no one particularly happy. i’d been rather against the movie since adam returned from the theater spitting and cursing. he hadn’t been that riled up since Planet of the Apes.
each of us put our respective baggage behind us and decided if this is the film that’s going to sweep oscars, we may as well see it. we emerged as surprised as we’d been initially lukewarm. we agreed on the following: (a) it shortshrifts the woman. what about her life/painting/math ability/career/happiness? she stood behind her man. admirable. surely she deserved a little more indepth examination than the movie afforded her; she could have been more of a person and less of a Wife. and the film fails the ms. test right off the bat as it only has one female character. Apollo 13, if you recall, had the same flaws.
(b) the ending is silly. we all agreed that living functionally with schizophrenia should have been the ultimate original achievement he has looking for. if he managed to be a good father and husband and teacher and member of society with that plague, that’s more impressive than a Nobel.
on the other hand, crowe’s performance is as excellent as everyone says it is. there’s no way around it (sorry adam): it’s a quality movie.