DEPARTMENT OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES, NALSAR

UNIVERSITY

REPORT ON BUSINESS ETHICS

MOVIE REVIEW REPORT ON THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS

BY
Abhishek Dasari (13)
D. Sai Manoj Reddy (14)
E. Sharmila (15)
M. Niheeth (25)
Vineeth Balakrishnan (49)
Y. Sai Venkata Rami Reddy (51)
MBA 19-21
ROLL NO - 51

SUBMITTED TO
MS. BIGNYA PATNAIK
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR,
INSTRUCTOR: BUSINESS ETHICS
INTRODUCTION

The Pursuit of Happyness is a Biographical drama film directed by Gabriele Muccino based
on the true-life incidents of a man named Christopher Gardner a homeless salesman
struggling to raise his son. Will smith acted as Christopher Gardner and Jaden smith as
Gardner’s son Christopher Jr. Movie the Pursuit of Happyness is based on the struggle faced
by Christopher Gardner being homeless and how he faced and came out of those struggles
with his son beside him.

The title of the movie The Pursuit of Happyness comes from the signboard placed on the wall
at the day-care where he used to drop his son before leaving for work

SUMMARY

Based on the true-life incidents of a man named Christopher Gardner back in 1980, who is a
hardworking salesman used to sell bone density scanners and invested everything he got into
the scanners and left with nothing except his son and the Scanners, his wife abandons him
and his son. Somehow Christopher manages to get himself an unpaid internship at a
prestigious brokerage firm named Dean witter for six months as he is fed up with selling
scanners and chooses to change his carriers. To see himself as a professional broker with a
good salary Chris needs to prove his boss that he is the best out of the 20 people who had
signed for the internship, in the meanwhile Chris needs to sell the remaining scanners to
survive for the six months. Chris determined himself to go to any extent to get the paying job
and struggles day and night as life becomes cruel and challenging. Chris finally succeeds and
gets the paying job with Dean Witter and within seven years Chris set up his on Brokerage
firm named Garden rich & Co.

PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS ENDING:

After getting selected for the internship training program, Chris finds out that it is non-paid.
This makes him very disappointed but he was determined to get the training done and move
on to the paid job. Chris works day and night at the stockbroker office. The schedule is very
hectic and he barely gets through the month. He still relies on selling 3 units of bone density
analyzers which is a luxury medical product. He struggles to sell them and doesn’t make
enough money for himself, his wife and son. The wife leaves him and this makes him even
more depressed because she was doing 2 jobs to run the house.

Chris feels like he is not keeping up even at work and his coworkers are younger, dynamic,
and are doing better than him. He feels like his superiors are also pressurizing him and the job
is too demanding. But he doesn’t deter from his task because he has the responsibility of his
son on his hands and continues slogging as an inter. He then gets a call from his superiors. He
is very nervous at this moment as to what they have to say to him. He looks shaky and
nervous as he enters the board room. His boss then reveals to him that he’s promoted to a
full-time stockbroker at the firm. Chris gets very emotional at this moment and controls his
tears. The boss hands him over his first pay. Chris thanks them and walks out of the room and
heads out onto the street. Here he bursts into tears and starts clapping in happiness and thinks
to himself that he has finally tasted true happiness after so many years of misery. He runs to
his son’s daycare center and hugs his son in joy because he was promoted to a paying post.

The ending of the movie basically shows a slice of life of the common man and what he faces
on a day to day basis. A small thing such as landing a low paying job is the thing that makes
some people the happiest and get them out of misery.

The movie ends with two messages that pop up on the screen that says Chris gardener’s life is
based on a true story and he moves on to be the owner of a multi-millionaire stock firm. He
also sells the company for a multimillion deal in 2006. Which further proves that sticking to
your roots and being an honest and hard-working person will always bring success.

IDENTIFICATION OF ETHICAL DILEMMA

In the movie Pursuit of Happyness, Chris Gardner face an ethical dilemma in many situations
he faces in life. Where there is two main dilemma that affects his life immensely are his wife
Linda leaves Chris and his son due to financial crises created by Chris by investing the entire
money on portable scanners without knowing the demand in the market for them with an
intention get more profit which out to be a bad decision and push them into financial crises.

In the movie, Chris Gardner takes a sharing ride with one of the businessmen to impress him
and get a job but he will not have money to pay for the taxi so he cheats the taxi driver and
leave without paying money, even though Chris doesn't like to cheat but he doesn't have an
option rather than cheating so we can say he is in an ethical dilemma.
In the movie, Chris Gardner also faces the dilemma where he has to go to jail for not paying
traffic ticket traffic and go to interview the next day in ratty jeans and a white t-shirt.

PROCESS OF HANDLING ETHICAL DILEMMA AND EVALUATING

DILEMMA WITH THEORY OF ETHICS

In a dilemma with his wife, Chris Gardner handle the situation more patiently and as a
responsible parent, he takes the care of his son. This dilemma can be evaluated through the
virtue theory of ethics in which maintain good relations is very important for any person and
Chris Gardner also acted courageously by not leaving his son in a financial crisis also.

In a dilemma where Chris Gardner has to face an interview for a big company in ratty jeans
and white t-shirts but Chris Gardner never lose his integrity and honesty while interviewers
ask for the reason of his appearance, he answered honestly by saying about his financial crisis
and he has to come from jail for not paying a traffic ticket. This honesty helps him to get an
internship in that company. This dilemma can be evaluated by the virtue theory of ethics
according to which he adopted the ideal of human life like honesty and integrity.

SUGGESTIONS ON WHAT COULD BE ETHICALLY CORRECT

DECISION IN THE MOVIE

It's an amazing film for any of us who have ever lived near the edge monetarily and
acknowledged "There yet for the beauty of God go I" when we've seen another person
cleared out by separation, malady, or tough situations. There are minutes in "PURSUIT"
where the assurance of Chris Gardner to keep his child, work to no end and endure instead of
quit will make us cry. Will Smith grows up as an entertainer who can investigate the dull
spots that lie underneath the humour and mind of the man who won't inform you concerning
his enduring in light of the fact that he has a lot of pride.

The ethically correct decision according to us is that in the movie, Chris Gardner made was to
stick up with is moral and ethical decisions that he made during the tough times in which he
travelled in the movie. He was firm towards his ethical values which include “Virtue ethics”
and “Situation ethics”.

In this movie, we could observe that Chris Gardner shows strong virtue ethics in the scenes in
which Chris gardener is left alone with his son and his wife leaves him even in this tough
situation he never felt lost, hopeless and never felt that he should give up on his son he
showed huge courage though he was broken emotionally and when he had to spend the rest of
night with his son homeless in a railway subway he always was hopeful of a better tomorrow
and was courageous and never left helpless to maintain his kid and leave the custody of his
child to his ex-wife. We suggest that Chris Gardener was acting ethically correct dealing with
all kinds of emotions he faced dealing with them and never acting outside of his ethics and
his ethics were correct.

In other scenes where we suggest that the strong ethical values which Chris Gardner where
she shows situation ethics is in the scene where he jumps out of a taxi and runs and escapes to
avoid paying fare because he has no money with him in that situation he shows strong
situational ethics and we consider that if we were in his place and we would do the same.
Next part in which he attends the interview directly after he is been released from police lock-
up in a dirty shape he was as he has no time to clean himself and present himself at the
interview even in that shabby attire and tough situation, he was able to manage to convince
the interviewers about his tough time and was selected.

Most of all things Chris Gardner was a black American, in the time in which the movie was a
plot to happen there was huge racial discrimination against blacks in America thus with is
strong ethical values he was able to overcome this discrimination along with his personal and
trouble times with gaining trust and confidence with his bosses and making them believe that
he is ethically strong and fit for this job.