“The Pursuit of Happyness”

Left me in tears. No, it isn't an emotional movie but it connects with people, especially the
ones who have had a lot of hardships and failures in their lives.

“The Pursuit of Happyness” is a 2006 American biographical drama film directed by

Gabriele Muccino based on entrepreneur Chris Gardner's nearly one-year struggle being
homeless. Directed by Gabriele Muccino, the film features Will Smith as Gardner, a
homeless salesman who loses everything, but eventually gets everything. In the movie The
Pursuit of Happyness, he is a hard-working, caring and loving father, who struggles
financially to provide for his wife and son. Although the real story is somewhat different
from the plot of the movie, you can still feel that Chris Gardner is a man of courage,
perseverance, and faith. His wife left him and fate took him to a lifestyle he had never
thought of. He became homeless, and while he had to take care of his little son, he worked as
a salesman (he sold medical devices, that according to one of the characters in the movie
were useless). Then, he finds an unpaid 6-month-internship position at a brokerage firm. He
struggles to get contracts for the firm while trying to make an honest living for his son. He
has to pick up his son at the day care center and he also has to be on time to get a room in one
of the local homeless shelters. His life was the one that you think you could never handle. His
talents and skills, along with his charisma and personality, earned the trust of several people
who signed contracts with the brokerage firm. At the end, we see that he got the one paid
position and his life changed dramatically from that moment.

The great surprise of the picture is that it's not corny. It may have seemed that way from the
trailer: Will Smith tells his son, "Don't ever let anyone tell you that you can't do something --
even me. You got a dream. You gotta protect it. People can't do something themselves, they
wanna tell you can't do it. If you want something', go get it." But in context, even that
moment isn't cloying. The beauty of the film is its honesty. In its outlines, it's nothing like the
usual success story depicted on screen, in which, after a reasonable interval of
disappointment, success arrives wrapped in a ribbon and a bow. Instead, this success story
follows the pattern most common in life -- it chronicles a series of soul-sickening failures and
defeats, missed opportunities, sure things that didn't quite happen, all of which are
accompanied by a concomitant accretion of barely perceptible victories that gr0adually
amount to something. In other words, it all feels real.

Thandie Newton comes as a wife who loses her hope and trust on his husband. Janden Smith
acting and character was charming and cute. William Smith generally known for humorous
and action roles, has done a different Master class a Man fighting for his Family for money.
Everybody in this movie give their best.

Why is happiness spelled wrong in the title?

The title is intentionally misspelled, as it also appears as graffiti in a scene in the film. The
misspelled phrase is actually taken from an essay written in 1776 that argued that whites and
blacks were created equal. The essay, which was written by Lemuel Haynes, a biracial man
living in New England during the Revolution, quoted Thomas Jefferson's well-known
sentence from the United States Declaration of Independence, but spelled the last word of the
sentence with a y. The sentence, as it appears in Lemuel's essay, is as follows: "We hold these
truths to be self-Evident, that all men are created Equal, that they are Endowed By their
Creator with Certain unalienable rights that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of
Happyness."

This film is way too sad. A lot of scenes are extremely depressing, and the soundtrack is so
manipulative. Every time there's a sad scene, the soundtrack plays a sad song as if to imply
that they don't trust the audience to feel sad on their own, so they have to play a sad song to
get them to feel sad. On top of that, the plot is literally nonexistent. We're basically just
watching the life of some guy who looks like Will Smith. That's the entire movie. I know it's
based on real events, but the reason movies based on real events exist is because those events
are interesting. And the events in this movie just aren't.

Seven Life Lessons from “The Pursuit of Happyness” Movie

1. Raising a child on your own is very difficult.

Almost at the beginning of the The Pursuit of Happyness movie, his wife leaves him and his
son, so he needs to deal with working and caring for his son. He loves his son, and everything
Chris does is for him.

2. Being poor did not stop him from being what he wanted.

He believed that success depended only on his efforts, not fate or luck. He has a dream, he
keeps it, and goes after it.

3. The relationship between father and son.

I am so glad that Will Smith acted along with his son. That makes the movie more engaging
and more natural. Chris and his son are friends and love each other. They have a very mature
relationship that every father wants to have with his children, especially if they are boys. This
connection makes things a little bit easier and makes the son proud of his father.
4. Life will sometimes be tough.

If you are rich, maybe you will never taste of necessity. But for most of us, at one point life
was or is tough. Chris loses his house, goes to a motel, and eventually he ends up living in a
homeless shelter. He and his son even spend a night in a subway station restroom. Life
humiliates him. He tastes bitterness and then tastes happiness.

5. When things get dark, relax.

He had finished his internship and had finished selling all the medical devices. He did not
have anything else to do and did not know what the future would bring him. Since he was in
the final days of the internship and did not know what was going on, he decided to go to the
beach and to sleep in a hotel. That shows that even though you do not know what will
happen, you deserve a break and to treat yourself to something nice. After all your hard work
and patience, you deserve it.

6. We receive what we want after doing everything we can.

Towards the end of “The Pursuit of Happyness” movie, you see that Chris Gardner sold all
his medical devices, but the IRS took all his money for unpaid taxes. He takes the final exam
at the brokerage firm, he does his best, and he just needs to wait. No money, no other place to
go, he just waits….Then, at the end of the movie, the most intriguing moment arrives. When
he does not even know what is going to happen, he receives the great news. He gets the job,
and all his problems end. The scene in the office where he is talking to the managers really
moves you. One of the managers asks him “Chris, was it easy?” and he replies, “No sir, it
wasn’t”. That part of his life is what he calls happiness.

7. You can’t let people discourage you from your dreams just because they have been
unsuccessful themselves.

The scene on the basketball court when the character Will Smith was playing was trying to
discourage his son from spending too much time on the basketball court because he didn’t
feel his son could excel at the sport. He was probably giving his son this advice due to the
many failures he had experienced, not just from his failures at the sport but from his failures
in life in general.

This movie is gonna play with your emotions. You are gonna cry, laugh along with the
characters. An amazing and realistic father son scenario is well portrayed. This movie can
really inspire you. It’s amazing package of some amazing stuff. This movie is an outstanding
family drama to watch out for, and also teaches us never to stop working, besides failure. I
would like to recommend this movie to every people who lose their hope on their struggling.

MPAA Rating: PG-13

Run Time: 1h 57m
Genre : Biography, Drama
Personal Rating: 4.5 out of 5
This review is written by Syed Mohat Masrur. He is a 2nd semester student of Independent
University of Bangladesh major in International Business. Masrur likes to make travel video.
Nowadays he try to make some short film. He love to watch movie specially thriller movie. It
is the first time he reviewed a movie “The Pursuit of Happyness” and it was a nice experience
for him.