The Pursuit of Happyness

Panning the Hollywood stream of movies looking for little gold nuggets of American values presents a real challenge. Most films reflect the liberal, if not extremely left wing, element that tends to dominate the entertainment industry. Last night I watched on DVD a film that shocked me in its dedication to good old fashioned capitalism.

"Pursuit of Happyness" stars Will Smith as Chris Gardiner, a down on his luck entrepreneur trying to hold his family together. He invested all of his money into medical equipment that resembles much less expensive technology and naturally has difficulty selling the products. The backdrop of this film is San Francisco in 1981 during the deep recession that preceded the Reagan era prosperity. At his lowest moment his wife leaves him and he is evicted from his apartment for non payment of rent. However he takes a six month unpaid internship at Dean Witter. Twenty interns get a chance to compete for one position as a stockbroker.

The film runneth over with positive messages of hard work, sacrifice, and opportunity. Ronald Reagan himself appears during one of the low points, giving America a pep talk in some of the worst economic times of his presidency. Of course now we know that his policies helped to build twenty five years of prosperity. This definitely seems to be foreshadowing teh development of Gardiner's own life. The Dean Witter executives come across as real people, not cariciatures of evil capitalist monsters. Material reward for hard work is Gardiner's ultimate goal throughout the movie and never is he presented as "learning a lesson" that some things are more important than money. Gardiner could take a menial job and support himself, but he chooses to live in homeless shelters and on the street while making connections in the business world to help him succeed. His words to his son are to not let anyone ever tell him he can't do something. Even characters that are presented as positive in most other Hollywood films come off as negative here. Gardiner entrusts a hippy girl on the street with a valuable machine, which she steals as soon as he is out of sight.

This film teaches more about what capitalism is all about than any economics class I have ever seen. Chris Gardiner chose to sacrifice, to work hard, and to never make excuses. He risked a great deal for an uncertain shot at success. In the end he was rewarded, but even if he was not, the film suggests he would simply try something else.

"The Pursuit of Happyness" inspires not just because it is a great story. Chris Gardiner is a real human being who eventually founded his own firm. He is a modern day hero in that he endured hardship out of faith. Gardiner had faith in America and its capitalist values. We could all learn from his example.