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Mozart and the Whale

2005 film by Petter Næss

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 16, 2026
Entity authorityQ250836 ↗
Source-derived summary

Mozart and the Whale (released as Crazy in Love in some parts of Europe) is a 2005 American romantic comedy drama film directed by Petter Næss and starring Josh Hartnett and Radha Mitchell. The film is loosely based on the lives of Jerry and Mary Newport.

Plot

Donald Morton (Josh Hartnett) is a taxi driver with Asperger syndrome 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 taxicab 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 will 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), who also has Asperger's, 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.

Editorial summary

“Mozart and the Whale” enters the record as 2005 film by Petter Næss. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Mozart, Whale and film can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA useful identification and reception guide that helps separate the work itself from editions, performances, ownership and later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2005—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 2005-01-01. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Mozart, Whale and film.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Mozart and the Whale” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Mozart, Whale and film provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q250836. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2005.

Critical limits

Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Mozart and the Whale”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Mozart and the Whale primary sources, Mozart and the Whale archive and Mozart research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Mozart and the Whale”?
  2. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Mozart and the Whale” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.