5/10
A BEAUTIFUL MIND (2001). Russell Crowe is excellent in Ron Howard’s adaptation of the best selling book about Nobel Prize winning mathematician John Nash, but the film itself is too much of an Oscar-grabber to work as well as it should have. Howard is the most conventional of directors, who never knowingly takes risks, and ladles syrupy music on every scene without regard for the nuances of the plot. Another plus point is Paul Bettany as a friend with a difference.
