THE FOUNDER

A Movie Critique
 MOVIE DETAILS

ACTORS TECHNICAL
Michael Keaton Ray Kroc DIRECTOR
Nick Offerman Dick Mcdonald John Lee
Hancock
John Caroll Lynch Mac Mcdonald WRITER
Laura Dern Ehtel Kroc Robert D. Siegel
Linda Cardellini Joan Smith EDITOR
B.J Novak Harry Sonneborn Robert Frazen
Wilbur Fitzgerald Jerry Cullen COMPOSER
Patrick Wilson Rollie Smith Carter Burwell

CRITIQUE AUTHORS

Jose Fernan Catubig Raquesa Niña Sabejon

Ronah Abigail Bejoc Ronald Dela Cerna
Rojah Lu
 PLOT SUMMARY

The Founder is a story about how the world-famous McDonalds started out. It begins with a
salesman named Ray Kroc who is unable to sell milkshake mixers to restaurants despite his many
attempts. One day, he got a call from a particular restaurant in San Bernardino that made such
unusual large order. Out of curiosity, he decided to see for himself in order to know what the hype
was all about. As soon as he got to the place, he discovered this restaurant run by the McDonalds
brothers which has a family-friendly atmosphere, a high quality menu, and an efficient service that
he has never seen or experienced before. He was offered a tour of the restaurant and after seeing
its potential, he suggested on franchising it. Nevertheless, the brothers explained that they did try to
franchise the food business, but was unsuccessful. Ray, however, was very persistent and
convinced them to try again, with him leading the franchising efforts.
Hence, Ray and the brothers entered into a contract, including stipulations that any changes
or decisions towards the business shall be received and approved by the brothers first and he was
given all the rights to market the brand. Eventually, representing himself as “The Founder”, Ray was
successful in building his first restaurant and attracting new investors for the said food business,
including a man named Rollie Smith, along with his wife Joan that Ray, a married man, was
instantly attracted to.
However, due to the limitations of the contract in terms of decision-making, he encountered a
lot of financial difficulties, but not until he met a lawyer named Harry Sonneborn, who suggested
that the real profits are not from the food business, but in providing real estate to the franchises.
According to Harry, creating his own company and attracting investors will give him the power and
control over the brothers, which he did. He named his company “McDonalds Corporation” and
demanded to be released from his contract with the brothers by offering them a blank check to be
bought out. The brothers, realizing that they can never win against Ray, named their price and
sealed the deal in person. However, Ray's lawyer said that the 1% earnings will have to be carried
out through a handshake.
The story ends with Ray, divorcing his wife and marrying Joan until his death. The brothers
never earned the promised 1% earnings and were forced to change their business name into “The
Big M” since Ray now holds the intellectual property over the original brand name.
IMPRESSION AND CORRELATION

The movie was indeed a different punch to the gut of consumers worldwide to think
that they’re favourite fast food chain would’ve have started out the way that it did. It’s
definitely an unconventional way of skyrocketing through the consumer market and
dominating the world’s food industry considering that everyone was accustomed to think
that the only way to reach the top is to start on the very bottom on your own. However,
with what Ray Kroc has done with McDonald’s is that he capitalized on two persons’
talents and used it to pave a different and, with the current results, successful way for a
business to boom. Although this wasn’t the typical rags- to-riches story or the good-guy-
gets-everything-in-the-end kind of concept, it still gives viewers a huge reality-check on
their perceptions of the business industry. It was our initial impressions to think that the
movie depicted capitalism as the enemy but giving it more thought, it was lack of vision
that ruined the McDonald’s dream for the brothers. Morally speaking, Ray Kroc is the
bad guy for showing no remorse for the betrayal he has committed to two innocent but
hardworking men, the brothers, but watching the movie we couldn’t help but secretly
root for Kroc after seeing how blatantly content the brothers were with their business
despite it showing shades of mediocrity in spite of its success. The bitter truth wasn’t
sugar coated and we, as young and ambitious as we are, know that the real world does
not give recompense to those who are not willing to seize every opportunity thrown their
way, be it morally right or wrong. This odd and yet wonderful film perfectly correlates to
our lives as accountancy students and below is a breakdown of the number of
similarities that we saw from the movie:

 ON BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT

For a good idea or concept to prosper and outlast its authors, it should not stay
only as good but should evolve and become great. For the past years that we’ve been
learning about the business industry, we’ve already learnt so much about how to
manage a business, or the staff, or its finances and as a result of that we have seen
how great Ray Kroc was at using all the available resources around him and making
things work. One great example would be how he managed one of the biggest issues
that prompted to halt his empire dream and that was his franchisees. In the movie, when
he starts to branch out McDonald’s, he is seen talking with people from the elite class,
to which he referred to as “the idle elite” later on, and scoring franchise deals with them.
However, the problem started to arise when this first batch of franchisees saw the
franchise as a way to make passive income, sort of like an investment for the long-run
and didn’t really see eye-to-eye with Kroc on his principles of how to handle this
business. They were carefree, tolerant, and perhaps ignorant – in a sense – which
delayed success for Kroc so he decides to not deal with the already too complacent elite
and decides to franchise to the working class, people who he saw was the same as him
and was determined to persist through anything. This alone, shows how quick he is on
his feet and what a good businessman he is which sets a good example to people like
us. He shows us that he does not and should not stick to the traditional ways of
business but rather to expand and explore better options.

 ON LEGALITIES

If we were teachers and we wanted to show our students how the law perfectly
incorporates itself in the business, we would show this movie specifically. For one, it
shows and teaches us that the law, more importantly, business law, is essential to the
success of every business that has dominated the industry. You could see that the
whole McDonaldization endeavor started with contracts. As the movie progresses, you
could see the impact that contracts, specifically the stipulations in them, have on how
far and how limited can one go about his business. The brothers, who were hesitant
with the idea of starting a different franchise move, saw to it that a contract should be
made and signed so as to ensure that they still have control over something they have
worked so hard on. This, then, leads to the lesson which every student should have in
mind when you sign a contract; this is final and is in writing. Everything that you do in
your business in the future, highly rides on the stipulations expressed in the contract.
This means that when you have any kind of regrets in the future, something like this,
which you’ve already signed and agreed upon consensually, is going to be something
that will be hard to change. It would cost a lot and sometimes, even, at the cost of your
own morality, but, that’s how things have always been and one must learn to live around
it in order to succeed. This lesson was personified through Kroc, he found a way to work
around the contract the bound him, more importantly, he did it legally which shows how
vast the possibilities become when one is educated and perceptive of the law.
LEARNINGS OR LESSONS YOU GOT FROM THE FILM

o “Persistence is powerful. Determination is powerful.”

What we have learned in the movie was that if you want to be successful in life,
you need to be persistent and determined because no matter how talented or
smart you are if you are not willing to go through challenges then you will not
become successful. Just like in the movie, Ray Kroc was determined that he will
become successful just like the other people so he did not give up even if other
people already lose faith on him. After how many tries, he wins. Just like in our
life, we all have dreams that we want to achieve, some of us work really hard for
it and some just easily give up after they have been rejected or not wanting to go
through challenges. So, the people who will become successful in life are those
who do not give up easily and will try to find ways for them to achieve what they
want.

o We also learned that “you cannot be successful alone; you need other
people”. When you want to start a business, hiring people is one of the first
priorities. The hiring process isn’t something that should be taken lightly, just
because someone has succeeded in the past does not qualify them to become
part of your business. What use is the individual’s success when you can’t even
see eye-to-eye on things concerning the business. You need to look past the
facts and consider the person’s attitude towards your business. Thus, we would
like to reiterate the problem Kroc encountered when he sealed deals with the
elite class.

o “Fortune favours the bold”

We heard this line from Joan Smith when she said this to Ray Kroc that he is
bold. What we have learned is that when you want to be successful, you need to
be willing to take the risks. You need to be courageous enough to try something
so that you will know if that is the right thing for you to achieve your dream. It is
because when you take the risk and it did not turn out okay then at least you
learn something from it and can do better next time. The problem that some of us
have is that we are afraid to take the risks because we think that it will just a
 waste of

time, waste of money and etc. but it is not. Watching Ray Kroc made us believe
that fortune really favours the bold.

o In our generation today, there are already many businesses that have been built
and we can say that it is hard to think of another business that will beat your
competitors. In the movie, there is this line saying “if you cannot beat them,
buy them.” This is a principle that all business students should accept. Copying
or following what successful people isn’t the cowardly way, but, rather a different
stepping stone which allows to work with practices that have been proven and
tested and thus could guarantee you your own success enough to get you
standing on your feet. Sometimes, in business, humility is needed and this movie
shows you how your humility at the beginning could open new doors for you in
the end.

o When entering into a contracts, we must be smart enough. We should be

smart enough to not get tricked and should be smart enough to deal with others
fairly. The movie also shows how you can get out of sticky situations easily when
you know the law similar to how Kroc maneuvered his way around the contract.
Although, to some it may seem morally incorrect but that’s just one more pill to
swallow. Morality and law is complicated and depends on perception. What may
be moral to some may be unlawful to others.

o Looking from the experiences of the McDonalds brothers before they are settled
is that having a business is not easy because you need to think of a strategy, you
need to know what makes you unique from your competitors and how you can
persuade the people to buy or choose your business. However, we also learned
that being contented with something on an average level doesn’t really sit well
with how treacherous the business industry can be. You have to be gritty, you
have to be ambitious. Persistence, after all, has beaten talent in this one.
WHY DID YOU CHOOSE THIS MOVIE TO CRITIQUE OR REVIEW?

Firstly, as persons who constantly dine in one of the most popular fast foods
worldwide, we wanted to know the origin and history of McDonalds—how it started merely as
a small restaurant to becoming an empire that it is today. Secondly, as students learning
about Law on Sales in this semester, we also wanted to focus on a movie involving
transactions that actually take place in the business world, so that we will be able to apply
everything we learned in this subject. After considering the aforementioned two factors, we
all agreed to critique the movie entitled, “The Founder”, which was released in 2016. It was
actually suggested by one of our members, and after reading the plot and watching the
whole movie, we all agreed that this is the best choice.

“Contracts are like hearts; they are meant to be broken.”—this is one of the best lines
that we consider a highlight in our chosen movie. Upon knowing that the group has to
choose a movie to write a critique on, we all agreed that this movie would best suit
everything, since it involves about the different stages in the contract, obligations and rights
of the contracting parties, and a lot more provisions related to a contract of sale. Studying
Law on Obligations and Contracts during our first semester in college, we were taught that a
breach in contract gives rise to certain consequences, which is not always favorable to the
guilty party. Because of this, we were curious of the reason as to why Ray Kroc, the main
lead in the movie, said such line. The desire to know where he was coming from and why did
he have the need to say such words really piqued our interest in the movie.