ABM is an extraordinary love story, one that I have had an affection for since I saw it for the first time and every other time after that. It's difficult sometimes to conjure romantic images of a brainy mathematical wonk and a lovely and similarly brilliant woman but John and Alicia Nash’s love story is by far, to me, one of the most beautiful I've ever encountered.
John Nash is a mathematical genius who suffers from schizophrenia and whose story I’ll not trivialize in the little space I have available to tell it. Rent the film, read his biography, he’s an incredible human being.
Schizophrenia causes John Nash to see and hear people who aren't there. He sometimes can’t distinguish between real people and those imaginary ones his mind has created. His self described delusions put his family in danger and at a point, where he was incapable of any differentiation between his real and imagined worlds, his wife had to make a decision whether or not to permanently commit John to an institution .
At their most desperate moment, when they stood at the edge of their own personal abyss, Alicia and John face each other and he asks her...How do I know what's real?
Alicia whispers with amazingly loving conviction, You want to know what's real? This is..... as she places her hand on John's heart. Then she takes his hand and gently places it on her face. Looking deeply into his eyes, so very softly she says....This is real. This, is real.”
Such a profound moment. Alicia, in the madness that surrounds her and envelopes John, manages to disconnect him from all of the noise his world has become. Stopping time for a moment, she is able to show him the only part of his world that is real. Despite the danger and frustration and burden of living with John’s schizophrenia, Alicia chooses to believe in their love rather than logic. She fully understands the impossibility at that time of overcoming a mental illness such as John's...but she looks past conventional wisdom and medical opinion and believes that together they can find their own solution similarly extraordinary as those mathematical equations that John’s beautiful mind had discovered. While John and Alicia Nash lived an unconventional and complicated life, their love remained longlasting.
I've always thought of that moment in film to define the truest and simplest example of love. Real love. I like to think about having such a belief in love over logic. I like to think about what it is to have such conviction and belief in something that for most doesn't exist. I like to think about conventional wisdom and extraordinary equations. I like to think about slipping into a place of quiet peace amidst life's chaos and asking, How do I know what's real?
I also like to think about not really needing to hear a reply because I already know.
I already know.
Indeed.
