Making science look like an interesting topic to the lay public may not be the easiest task to achieve. We only have to look at the scarce filmography that deals with the life and work of great personalities of any science to discover how difficult it is to strengthen the ties between the common public and the distant (but fascinating) scientific world. Those who gained cinematic notoriety did not achieve it only for their genius and their scientific contribution to humanity. Stephen Hawking has won at least two biopics - driven largely by the fame he gained as a genius who overcame the physical devastation wrought by his illness. Other personalities from the scientific and technological world already had their media appeal well established before their stories were taken to the big screen. Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg are good examples, portrayed in Jobs and The Social Network, respectively.

Making a biopic is a task of the gods. After all, there is no perfection, because there is always someone who will complain about the lack of some important fact, or that not everything was faithful to what really happened, etc. In the case of A Beautiful Mind, winner of the Oscar for Best Picture, what you see is a well-made production, but one that suffers from not addressing an important part of the honoree's life, demonstrating a lack of courage (or will) on the part of its producers in touch more painful topics. In this case, the "gay side" of John Nash that took him to prison.

Still, perhaps the most popular and critically successful example in this universe is A Beautiful Mind, directed by Ron Howard. The choice of director and screenwriter Akiva Goldsman for the story of the famous mathematician and professor - John Nash - was, once again, influenced by the disease that the American genius developed. The fascination provoked by the idea that such a genius mind had to live with a mental illness as serious as schizophrenia certainly contributed to thicken the dramatic broth of the film, which allows itself to recreate Nash's story without worrying about great historical precisions. A Beautiful Mind makes a lot of use of this argument - the productive mind of the famous mathematician had to live all his life between reason and delusion, between intellectual rigor and the disarray of his imagination. And the duo Howard and Goldsman knew how to balance this duality well to attract their audience.

As in The Insider, Crowe re-interprets, in A Beautiful Mind, a real character: mathematician John Forbes Nash Jr., who in the late 1940s developed a theory that would revolutionize economics in the following decades., but who, years later, ended up being diagnosed as schizophrenic due to his persecutory hallucinations and delusions of grandeur. With the failure of the treatments used at the time, Nash bet on "self-conditioning" as a way to fight the disease - and his struggle culminated in receiving the coveted Nobel Prize in 1994.

Always versatile, Crowe manages to compose the character through the use of relatively subtle nervous tics and other equally important details, such as the habit of tilting his head down when talking to other people, in a mixture of shyness and apparent insecurity (I say "apparent" because, as the plot unfolds, Nash reveals himself to be a guy absolutely confident in his own talent, even showing signs of extreme egocentrism - an early indication of his illness, obviously). Despite this, the mathematician is never portrayed in a stereotypical way, as Crowe is successful in addressing other aspects of his complex personality, such as his intellectual frustration at not being able to develop an "original idea" and, later, his heartbreaking embarrassment at being forced to medicate in front of a former colleague.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Connelly (undoubtedly one of the most beautiful actresses in Hollywood) does not let herself be overshadowed by her co-star and creates an equally strong and moving character, as her Alicia Nash is a woman determined to support her husband in every way possible. - even if it means living in a constant state of tension (it is precisely for this reason that their participation becomes more effective from the moment the mathematician's illness is discovered).

Ron Howard's film is more related to these three periods of Nash's history exactly as classic cinema proposes: the hero's journey divided between the beginning of the apogee, the difficulty faced and the happy resolution. Not that the mathematician's life wasn't that way, but as stated in the biography written by journalist Sylvia Nasar and on which the film is based, Nash went to prison in 1954 for indecent behavior. All because of his "deviations" from homosexuality. In the feature this is almost 99% excluded, although a scene at a dinner suggests an exchange of looks almost sexual between him and another man. Not that this affects the work as a whole. Perhaps the film's main problem is the extremely romantic view of the story, as if Alicia were the perfect wife who loves her husband so much that she almost silently suffers from his disorders. Jennifer Connelly ends up standing out precisely for having so little in her hands and transforming this woman into a well of deep and sometimes ambiguous emotions. Her performance won her the Oscar for Supporting Actress.

Ron Howard, who had shown himself to be a director with some talent in films like "Subject of Fire", does a good job of painting a fascinating portrait of John Nash, managing to turn even math into something exciting (I'm from the Humanities, remember...). Howard's direction is quite dosed, knowing how to balance the drama involving Nash's delusions with his redemptive romance with Alicia (Jennifer Connelly). When John's psychosis comes to a head, Howard chooses to close his plans in her ever-watchful eyes and startled mimicry.

The director has the intelligence to know when to use fast cuts and fast tracking shots to portray the moments when Nash's visual hallucinations reach their peak. Two other great characters are also part of these moments - the secret agent of the US government William Parcher (Ed Harris) and the charismatic roommate Charles (Paul Bettany). Despite all the catastrophe of her illness, not everything she produces is negative. Part of this world even creates true affection. The only caveat to his work in this film is the overly comical focus given to its protagonist's social inadequacy, which ends up leading some viewers to the mistaken notion that Nash's psychological problems are an amusing eccentricity, not a serious illness that deserves our regret. (and the soundtrack composed by James Horner is efficient in this sense, as it moves without becoming too sugary).

But if A Beautiful Mind is effective as fiction, there are some facilitations in its script that are unnecessary. The film could, for example, have given its audience more credit at times. Even without any connection to science, he could understand well enough that scientific work is more rigorous, demanding and expensive than the film suggests. John Nash certainly didn't elaborate his entire economic theory, which won him a Nobel Prize, with a simple insight on a bar table. He also didn't make a living writing his equations and calculations on windowpanes. All of this demonstrates an effort to romanticize the plot that goes a little too far. It's not just a lack of historical accuracy - a goal the film never had.

Using James Horner's magical soundtrack, the director adds to the basics with scenes that know how to blend imagination with reality, neither hiding nor hastily revealing the true nature of some of their characters. Special effects and editing tricks also help Howard give identity to a common storytelling format. Some scenes stand out, like Nash's trip to the Pentagon or the one that creates an immediate theory about how to win a girl.

The film's success is essentially due to its clever use of proven tactics. A straight-forward director responsible for the success of Apollo 13 (1995), Howard manages thriller, suspense, romance and drama just right. The plot exalts the mathematician's painful and edifying trajectory, always with a very happy ending. And the novel is based on the classic ideal of unconditional love. Allied to the inspired interpretations of Crowe and Connelly, the film proves to be exemplary within its own traditionalist perspective: without innovations or historical responsibility, but with a high level dramatic plot.