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12 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thank You for Saving My Life...Literally, August 18, 2007
I first saw this movie about five years ago. My wife had asked me to go see it with her. After we watched, I said to her, `I don't know how to tell you this, but I got to tell you something, and it is kinda hard to say." She said, "Go ahead, honey." So I said to her, "I don't know what that stuff is that Crowe has in that movie......" She says, "go on." "But I have it, too." She then says, "Well, we got to get you some help." The next day she tells me the soonest a psychiatrist can see me is in a month and a half. I tell her that I can't last that long. I need to see someone right away. A psychiatrist tells her to take me to the nearest ER room at a hospital.
Sitting in front of the ER doctor at a large hospital in the Denver suburbs, the doctor asks me, "So what's bothering you?" I tell him, "Oh, nothing really." (I'm afraid they are going to lock me up forever.) My wife across the little room says, "You have to tell him everything, to get help." So I proceed to tell him, "I'm hearing voices which are telling me to do terrible things. They are loud command voices, they don't stop, and I can't deal with it anymore. They say people in the neighborhood are plotting to kill me and my family."
He says, "Oh, you must have a microchip in the back of your head."
I exclaim back, "No, no, that's not possible! I never had a chip operation... I have a tooth. It's in the back of my mouth. It has a large filling in it. I got it when I was 15. The dentist put two pins in it, and the pins act like a harmonic receiver for a satellite in the sky." Then I paused again and looked over at my wife, and she said, "You got to keep going." I continued, "They are sending the voices to me through this tooth, and they can hear what I am saying when I speak. I am part of a super-secret military project, and they're communicating with me. For future one-man missions."
The doctor then left, and came back a few minutes later with two armed hospital guards. He read me my rights, and informed me that the state of Colorado allows him to put me on a 3-day involuntary commitment to get me medication and counseling. I was ready to jump right out of there, but my wife said, "They are going to help you, but you have to let them." So I went along with them to the psych ward of that general hospital, and they helped me by giving me a 10mg dose of tongue dissolvable Zyprexa, and I slept for about 19 hours. When I woke up, they let me talk to the doctor and some counselors. The medication gave me a clear brain, and stopped the voices and delusions. They released me to my wife that day (the day after admitting me). My wife was an angel.
This movie, that "3-day commitment", and the doctors & nurses with the meds are some of the best things that have every happened in my life. This movie gave me the courage to seek help. It is hard to take the news that I was not part of a special super-secret military project for 19 years. But instead I have a serious, chronic, incurable, brain disease. But that's life, that's my life. I now accept the fact that I have the brain disorder known as schizoaffective. It reminds me of the movie, "Predator". And it terrifies me.
Other people here have commented that the film does not portray the actual life of John Nash. Well, maybe it's because the real story of schizophrenia is too depressing for people to want to pay money to see. There simply is no pretty Hollywood ending to our story. And besides, Hollywood has skewed other films in the past that were supposedly about the life of a real person.
One that comes to mind so unnervingly is the movie, "Emily Rose." Talk about a farce! Oh, this movie was "INSPIRED BY" the life of Emily Rose. And then two consultants to the film with the title of Msr. in front of their names (this stands for Catholic monsignor priest) proceeded to make a girl's paranoid manic psychotic episode look like demon possession. That was cute. And what a cruel joke it is to all of us who suffer from psychotic brain disease (about 8 million US people - paranoid schizophrenia, psychotic bipolar I, psychotic depression & post-partum depression).
I can hardly wait until the researchers find a cure for this illness. Hopefully within the next 20 to 30 years. I hope and pray for this everyday. I'm sure John does, too. For the sake of our children.
You won't hear from many people with psychotic based-illness. It is simply too horrific to talk about. You can take my word for it. I say this because you all have paid a lot of money to send me to some of the world's best schools. Schools which uniquely teach soldiers how to look fear in its face, to confront it, and then to walk right through it. As I have posted before, and in spite of this myriad of specialized training, it still terrifies me to talk about this disease like I am doing now, and it takes a terrible toll.
To everyone who had a part in making this film, thank you. Thank you for saving my life, literally. I really appreciate that. So do my wife and two children. And thank you, John, for telling your story. You have helped us all. You will never know how much, because we simply cannot talk about it. As you already know.
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DVD ~ Jack Nicholson
DVD ~ Tom Cruise
DVD ~ Tom Hanks
DVD ~ Tim Robbins
DVD ~ Russell Crowe
