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The depiction of great mathematicians as insane in movies.. - Magical Realist - Apr 4, 2026
100 % insane? - The depiction of mathematicians in movies vs. reality
"Max Cohen is probably the prototype of a mathematician – the number theorist depicted in
Darren Aronofsky‘s directional debut “Pi” (1998) is socially inept, suffers from hallucinations
and paranoia and is obsessed with the idea to find underlying complete order in the real world.
And if you would ask non-mathematicians how they imagine a real mathematician to be, they
most likely would describe him or her like this – a genius mind but bordering on madness.
Insanity and mathematics. These terms do not seem to contradict each other. If we look at more
well-known films about mathematicians, they are almost always portrayed as outsiders, socially
incompetent or even mentally ill. Let us consider some examples:
There is “Proof”, a drama film directed by John Madden in 2005 based on the eponymous play
by David Auburn. Anthony Hopkins plays a brilliant and well-known mathematician that in
some point of his life suffers from mental illness and whose grip on reality is beginning to slip
away. His daughter (Gwyneth Paltrow), also a mathematician, struggles with the idea of having
inherited his mental illness as well.
Or take a look at Ron Howards’ biographical film “A Beautiful mind”. It won four Academy
Awards in 2001. Starring Russell Crowe as the famous mathematician, Nobel Laureate in
Economics, and Abel Prize winner John Nash who developed a paranoid schizophrenia at
university with which he had to deal his whole life.
These are not the only films about mathematicians: Not to mention “Imitation game” about
Alan Turing defeating the Enigma, “The Man Who Knew Infinity” about the Indian mathprodigy Srinivasa Ramanujan or “Good Will Hunting” about a young self-taught math-genius
displaying behavioral problems.
What is there to this representation? Is it just Hollywood that gives us this opinion about
portrayal of mathematicians? Or is there more to it? And above all: is it the mathematics that
drives mad, or is it the madman who is attracted to math?
Author of “Infinite Jest” David Foster Wallace who himself studied logic, philosophy and maths
states in “A Compact History of Infinity”: “The cases of great mathematicians with mental
illness have enormous resonance for modern pop writers and filmmakers. This has to do mostly
with the writers'/directors' own prejudices and receptivities, which in turn are functions of what
you could call our era's particular archetypal template.” Wallace himself suffered from
depression during his whole short life and committed suicide with 42 years of age.
First of all, one has to remark that some of the movies about mathematicians are actually
biographical. For example, it is true according to today's experts that Alan Turing actually had
most likely Asperger's syndrome. And also Nash suffering from schizophrenia is based on a
true story. Thus, insanity is or was at least among some of the most important mathematicians
of all centuries.
But maybe the depiction of mathematicians in movies just focusses on biographies, that are
more interesting than the ones of mentally healthy mathematicians? After all, these are the more
interesting stories and the ones that confirm our prejudices. And besides, shooting a film about
maths describing mathematical themes in correct but easy terms is difficult and boring, at least
more boring than a story about some exciting weirdo that is at the same time a genius. By the
way, the weird professor, the mad scientist may also be so popular in cinema as this cliché
maybe satisfies mathematically untalented and uninterested people envying the genius’ fame
and intelligence. They are confirmed with their hope that being gifted also has the other side of
the coin and that brilliant mathematicians therefore pay the prize of being crazy.
As for the Academy Award winning film “Good Will Hunting”, it actually deviates a bit from
the common portrayal of the mad scientist. On one hand Will Hunting has an undiscovered
talent for mathematics, but on the other hand he is somehow a normal young person who
manages to confront his past and face his future through therapy sessions. A human portrayal
of a gifted young person with whose struggles, insecurities and fears many young people can
certainly identify. Therefore, “Good Will Hunting” is an exception among films about
mathematicians.
Everyone who ever studied math or spent time with a group of mathematicians will have found
out that not just the math is often explained wrong in films, but also mathematicians are depicted
exaggeratedly eccentric to the point of crazy. Jonathan Farley, math Professor in Harvard, has
founded „Hollywood Math and Science Film Consulting” to advise screenwriters on how to
portray mathematics realistically in films. The consulting company did it for example very
successfully for the crime series „Numb3rs“. But what about the portrayal of the
mathematicians themselves?
According to Wallace there is a bit of dynamic: “It goes without saying that these templates
change over time. The Mentally Ill Mathematician seems now in some ways to be what the
Knight Errant, Mortified Saint, Tortured Artist, and Mad Scientist have been for other eras: sort
of our Prometheus, the one who goes to forbidden places and returns with gifts we all can use
but he alone pays for.”
But may there actually be an increased percentage of mental illness among mathematicians? If
one begins to research and collect, one would like to think that one actually finds many cases
of mathematicians that have suffered at some point of their lives of paranoia, schizophrenia or
depression and sometimes have even killed themselves. Besides Nash or Turing there are
Newton, who according to the latest findings certainly suffered from a bipolar disorder,
Grothendieck who retired in his forties to spend the rest of his life isolated in the Pyrenees after
revolutionizing geometry in the fifties and sixties and Cantor, creator of set theory and most
probably also bipolar. The list can be continued with statistician Nightingale, probably bipolar
too and logician Gödel who developed the paranoid idea that someone wanted to poison him
and finally starved himself to death when his wife was hospitalized and could not pretaste his
food for some months. Or we can even go back to Pythagoras who was convinced that all
numbers were rational. The Pythagorean community named after him forbade anyone to claim
otherwise. According to legend, when a brotherhood’s follower presented a proof of the
irrationality of the root of two, he was drowned.
The mad genius best known today among mathematicians may be Grigori Perelman who has
solved the Millennium problem of the Poincaré Conjecture but rejected both Fields Medal and
Clay Millennium Prize worth one million dollars. He shuns publicity and lives with his mother.
Maybe the idea for a new Oscar-winning biopic?
“I would not dare to say that there is a direct relation between mathematics and madness,” said
John Nash, “but there is no doubt that great mathematicians suffer from maniacal
characteristics, delirium and symptoms of schizophrenia.”
There are yet few studies about the connection between mental insanity and the ability of doing
maths. But already Seneca is supposed to have said: "There has never been a great mind without
admixture of madness" Is he right? In fact, there are many examples that seem to confirm the
assumption that there is and has always been a relation between creativity and mental health.
Maths can be seen in some way as a combination, an interaction, between creativity and an
analytical, scientific way of thinking.
So, the biographical investigation of mathematicians seems to verify Seneca’s assumption. And
now also genetics may do:
In 2001 Jon L. Karlsson published his paper “Relation of mathematical ability to psychosis in
Iceland”. A study that reveals that mathematically gifted Icelanders actually have an increased
risk of mental illness and that also their relatives are more likely to suffer from psychotic
disorders, two to three times more than expected on average. Much to the chagrin of Catherine,
the protagonist in the film “Proof” mentioned above who may have really inherited the insanity
of her father.
Biographical research and studies seem to confirm what Hollywood tells us in its movies. But
what could be the reason?....
.....One can conclude that one cannot say one hundred percent whether madness and mathematics
go together. There are many cases that speak against it and again many that strengthen this
hypothesis. But it can be said that to solve a mathematical problem, to tackle it at all, requires
a certain degree of obsession and urge and more even if you actually manage to succeed with
it. To quote the mathematician Andrew Wiles: “Pure mathematicians just love to try unsolved
problems – they love a challenge.” Madness?! Depends on the definition.
Somehow Nash himself admitted that: “Rationality of thought imposes a limit on a person’s
concept of his relation to the cosmos” and that his return to a normal mental state was in some
way detrimental to his occupation with unsolved problems.
And even if it does not always have to be madness that leads us to the result of a mathematical
problem, the occupation with itself often makes us drift into other dimensions that can make us
think of madness for the non-initiated. Many mathematicians experience thereby a degree of
distraction that lets them forget the reality around themselves. For topologist Witold Hurewicz
his obsession with such a problem even led to death when he fell off a Mayan pyramid in
Mexico in a moment of inattention."------- https://tomrocksmaths.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/essay_ruth-fuentes.pdf
RE: The depiction of great mathematicians as insane in movies.. - C C - Apr 12, 2026
(Apr 4, 2026 07:51 PM)Magical Realist Wrote: [...] As for the Academy Award winning film “Good Will Hunting”, it actually deviates a bit from
the common portrayal of the mad scientist. On one hand Will Hunting has an undiscovered
talent for mathematics, but on the other hand he is somehow a normal young person who
manages to confront his past and face his future through therapy sessions. A human portrayal
of a gifted young person with whose struggles, insecurities and fears many young people can
certainly identify. Therefore, “Good Will Hunting” is an exception among films about
mathematicians. [...]------- https://tomrocksmaths.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/essay_ruth-fuentes.pdf
That and "Pi" are the only ones I can recall ever watching, both involving fictional characters. Never thought about there being some aspect of studio depiction that was subconsciously turning me off with regard to the genre.