It is a good thing to have the difficulties of schizophrenia played out sympathetically before large audiences by an actor of Russell Crowe’s standing, good for viewers to understand not only some of the terrors of schizophrenia, but also that this illness can be fought and that some schizophrenics may lead lives that have value for them and for others as well. An uncritical viewing, however, would lead to too rosy a view of schizophrenia and of Nash’s struggle with it.

Many if not most schizophrenics, even if they understand their condition, cannot reason themselves out of their delusions as the film’s Nash says he has done. The actual Nash was apparently helped in the later years of his struggle by the chemical effects of aging, something that most schizophrenics do not benefit from. Before that, he was disabled by his condition for many years, and his marriage, in fact, did not survive his schizophrenia--although, remarkably, he and Alicia remarried recently after having been divorced for almost forty years.

And in reality there was no Nobel acceptance speech, Nash not having been invited to give one because of concern over his highly eccentric behavior. Finally, the film leaves open a possible connection between Nash’s schizophrenia and his brilliance as a mathematician. Whatever the truth in Nash’s case, schizophrenia--unlike bipolar disorder, which is often associated with creativity--typically involves distortions in cognition that make its "insights" difficult to connect with consensus reality.