CAGULADA, JOHN RALPH D.

August 15, 2021

UCSM Block 2

Reflection Paper on the Film “A Beautiful Mind”

A Beautiful Mind is a movie about a brilliant man named John Nash and his
life struggle with schizophrenia. In the beginning of the movie, John was a student at
Princeton University. During his college years, he kept mostly to himself and his
roommate Charles, but at the same time was trying to come up with a unique and
new mathematical theorem. Later in the movie, John became a professor at a
known university and married a girl named Alicia who is a graduate student at the
same university where he was teaching at. Later in the course of John’s life, he was
diagnosed with schizophrenia and became hospitalized, learning that his former
roommate, his former roommate’s adopted daughter, and his job as a department of
defense informant were all hallucinations. The movie portrayed the struggle of John
and his wife during the course of the illness. The movie tackled John’s treatment
with a psychiatrist, and his agonizing courses of insulin shock therapy. Medication
helped him improve partially- but only when he is compliant with the medication.
Eventually he began a comeback into the academic world at Princeton
University.Gradually, John pursued with his dream again despite his condition and
later on earned himself a Nobel prize.

Watching the whole movie is like riding a roller coaster of emotions. At the
beginning of the movie, it was a bit bland because it showed a typical story of a
college student. It portrayed how John was doing during the early days of his college
years- unproblematic and too idealistic. As the movie progressed, my emotions
went down as John experienced repeated misfortunes and failures with his
dissertation. However, my emotions flipped when John started his teaching career at
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It felt like I was watching a rom-com movie
when John started dating Alicia. I was really astonished on how intellectual people
date and romantically link with someone. I was tickled pink with their corny and
weird pick-up lines for each other. My emotions were over the roof at the climax of
the movie. I became emotional when Alicia, his wife, found out that John has
schizophrenia. It felt like the emotional struggle of Alicia transpired through the
screen I am watching at. I almost broke into tears when Alicia decided to stay with
John despite the hassle. Nevertheless, all my negative emotions were overpowered
by the fairytale-like ending.
 At the end of the movie, two realizations came into my mind. First, nobody
lives a perfect life. There’s going to be a lot of mess ups.  Despite the fact that John
is a genius, everything still wasn't perfect. He has been suffering from a mental
illness called schizophrenia without his awareness. While he has a superb ability in
logical and mathematical aspects, he had problems with his interpersonal
relationships. This ailment slowly eats up his mind, destroying his relationship with
the people around him. In addition, Alicia’s life was also far from perfect. Alicia may
have found her ideal man but it comes with a price. She has to give up her dream of
having an ideal family and accept the fact that her family is different from anyone
else’s. With this, I came up with my second realization that nothing is impossible.
John pursued his passion despite having schizophrenia and even won the Nobel
Prize. Also, Alicia did not give up on her husband and hold onto her dream of John’s
remission. It was very evident that she cared very much about him. She endured the
peaks and troughs of John’s life alongside him. Both of them were stubborn with
their dreams and chose to become the people who refuse to give up.

Their love story is worth emulating. I have to accept that, my life too, is not
perfect. We all want to pick that one perfect path that lands us exactly where we
want to be in life. But life doesn’t actually pan out this way. We don’t get to decide
whether or not life our lives include hitches and delays. I need to ride the waves of
life and believe that everything unfolds as it should. Each of us has a unique path
and destiny in life. We all have certain skills and special qualities that help us excel. I
have to keep in mind that all of these things will help me move forward all in due
time. Moreover, I have to believe that nothing is impossible just like how the couple
John and Alicia did.

In conclusion, this movie did an excellent job in highlighting the burden a

psychiatric illness can put on loved ones. It also emphasized the role of the family or
peers in the treatment of any psychiatric condition. The film also highlighted another
important component of mental health treatment which involves the adverse effects
of the medications and the importance of compliance to one’s regimen. Nash begins
treatment with an antipsychotic medication and experienced sedation, sexual
dysfunction, and he is unable to think clearly and develop new areas for research,
which prompted him to discontinue his medication without a physician’s advice. After
some time off with the antipsychotics, his delusions returned. This scenario is an
excellent teaching opportunity for medical students and it portrays the realistic
struggle with medication adherence in psychiatric patients.  Overall, this film is a
worthy teaching material that will augment traditional methods of conveying the
realities of mental illnesses to medical students.