Mozart and the Whale
| Mozart and the Whale | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Petter Næss |
| Produced by | Danny Dimbort Manfred D. Heid Frank DeMartini Robert Lawrence (producer) |
| Written by | Ronald Bass |
| Starring |
Josh Hartnett Radha Mitchell |
| Music by | Deborah Lurie |
| Cinematography | Svein Krøvel |
| Edited by |
Lisa Zeno Churgin Miklos Wright |
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Production
company |
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| Distributed by | Millennium Films |
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Release date
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Running time
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92 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $12 million |
| Box office | $84,447 |
Mozart and the Whale (released as Crazy in Love in some parts of Europe) is a 2005 romantic comedy-drama film starring Josh Hartnett and Radha Mitchell, and directed by Petter Næss.
The film tells the story of two people with Asperger syndrome (a form of autism). Donald runs a small self-help group for people on the autism spectrum who are more affected by their autism than he is. Mozart and the Whale is a fictional account, using characters loosely based on the real-life relationship of Jerry Newport and Mary Meinel (now Mary Newport).
Donald Morton (Josh Hartnett) is a taxi driver and drives two Japanese passengers and his pet cockatiel around Spokane, Washington. Distracted, he bumps into the back of a florist's van, damaging his stock. Unfazed, Donald and his budgie take their groceries and leave, abandoning his taxi cab and passengers. He takes his groceries to the self-help group for autistic adults. Before they head to the park to meet another autistic group, he tells one member, Gracie (Rusty Schwimmer), to gather the women and he'll gather the guys to practice telling personal stories, but keeps getting distracted by performing mathematical sums of the microwaves' depleting numbers. He notices that Isabelle Sorenson (Radha Mitchell), a new name, has signed up and tells Gracie to let her go first.
At the park, Isabelle tells the women of a childhood memory: she saw that her parents were happy an Olympian had broken a record, so in order to please her parents, and taking what she heard literally, she broke their music records. Donald tells his story to the men about his ability to do complex sums but couldn't make friends. Isabelle goes on to tell of when she was raped when she went hitch-hiking. This causes Gracie to laugh manically. Heard by Donald, he tries to calm an angry Isabelle down and they find that they have much in common and take a liking to each other.
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Wikipedia