THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS [review]

[princessaisly]

The Pursuit of Happyness

Okay, at first, when I saw the way they were spelling the word 'happiness' with a 'y', I was all like "What the fuck?" Seriously, why would they put that out there? (okay, my real first thought was that some retard at the studio mispelled it and it went to print because they're like, a bunch of uneducated jackasses or something... so I basically have NO faith in people's ability to you know, whatever) So then I realized it was a Will Smith movie. Now anyone that knows me knows I absolutely adore Will Smith, he's seriously like my favorite actor... ever. Which is saying a lot because I really like movies, I am a big fan of the 'moving picture industry'! Then I especially wanted to see (strike that, I was dying to see it) because I learned that the little boy in it, the one who plays his son... yeah, that's actually Jaeden [Christopher Syre] Smith, actual real life son of Will Smith. And he's absolutely adorable!

So anyway, if you don't know what this movie is about or have yet to see it I'd like to warn you...

Spoiler Alert!

So this movie is about this guy (oh yeah, it's set in 1981) who is super smart but has gotten kind of a bum deal (yeah, I said that, but it's an movie set in the eighties, which means I'm allowed to use phrases and sayings from that time... or whatever) in life. He's married to this bitch of a chick (played to a tee by Thandie Newton... who I'd like to point out is an actress I didn't particularly enjoy before, and hate even more now) who is always complaining about how he's a salesman, selling portable bone density scanners... yeah, it shocks me that he was able to sell any at all. These bone density scanners are basically the downfall of Chris [Will Smith] and whatshername's marriage. That and their son. She ain't exactly the motherly type and you really get that when she leaves them (in San Fransisco) to go to New York because her sister's boyfriend had just opened a restaurant and might have a job for her there... yeah, not the mama type.

Then Chris decides that he can do more with his life (well, he really decided this long before his wife left him and his son). He went after an internship for a stock-brokerage firm and they only accept 20 people every six months into this intense internship/training program. Chris has to move him and his son out of the apartment they lived in and into a hotel (that costs 1/2 of what they pay already). He sells all his scanners and it seems like he really might make it with his scanners all sold and them having a little bit of money and his internship going well and his ability to take care of his son all on his own and everything. Then the government takes six-hundred dollars out of his bank account for taxes that he couldn't pay earlier in the year and suddenly they're back to being broke with only $21.65 to last them another two months... and that's if he gets a job. Turns out that they only take on person out of the program every six months and if you don't get chosen you're contractually unable to apply to another internship/training program with another firm. So he's already had to work really hard a getting ahead when he has to go home two hours earlier than everyone else because he has to go get his son. (Plus the fact that he had to get two of his scanners back due to one getting stolen by a hippie and one getting dropped out of the subway because he had to ditch a crazy cab driver and was picked up by a crazy guy who insisted it was a time machine) He finds the second scanner right after the government (he already found the first) took almost all his money. Runs into Crazy McSchizo in a park with his son. He gets the scanner back and all he can think about is selling it (for two-hundred fifty) and travels all around town until he finds a doctor willing to see a demonstration... but turns out the psycho broke it, doesn't work. Doc tells Chris to come back later, when it's fixed, he'll still be willing to buy it. So they get back to their hotel room and find themselves locked out. And they have no where to go, so they go into the subway and end up sleeping in the bathroom, locking the door. As his son sleeps and someone (one must assume it was the janitor) bangs on the door, Chris cries quietly in desperation. The next day after work he takes his son to a womens/childrens homeless shelter and they're redirected to a church shelter where they get a place to stay for the night. but they have to be there by 5pm everyday or they won't get a room, and even if they are there they still might not get a room, because they only stay open until the beds are full, then the rest are turned away.

One day they have to find somewhere else to go because the beds are filled before he gets them in. So first they go to what I'm assuming was a hospital where Chris sells blood and gets enough money to buy a lightbulb for his scanner and then they ride the subway all night, sleeping on it. The next day he takes his board exams and feels rather confident about it. That Saturday he sells the scanner to the doctor from before and stay the night in a hotel.

The next day, the last day of his internship he walks into the office, knowing he did the best he could do. He talks to the man that helped him win the internship, and he's on the phone when he's called into the big conference room and told... that he got the job.

It goes on to say that he went on to start his own brokerage firm several years later and in 2001 (I think) he sold a small percentage of the firm for multi-millions. Yeah, he becomes a multi-millionaire. Never have I been so happy for someone to get rich, because this is a true story. And yeah, it made me cry.

And if you want to visit it's imdb page, well, here's the link for that too:
The Pursuit of Happyness