“The Pursuit of Happyness” Review
The Pursuit of Happyness is based on the true story of a man named Chris Gardner. At the beginning of the movie Chris, played by Will Smith, had a wife, a five-year-old son, and quite a bit of debt. Chris has this debt because he has had trouble selling Bone Density scanners which he invested all his savings into and signed a contract to because they were said to be the next big thing in the medical industry. The scanners ended up being seen as a ‘luxury’ because they gave only a slightly better imaging quality than normal X-rays. This made it very hard to sell the scanners, and eventually Chris was in big trouble. Without much income from Chris, the family started to fall apart. Linda, Chris’ wife, let and moved to New York where she could get a better job, but this means that she would leave Chris and Christopher.
Chris continues to struggle selling the bone-density scanners and he even has a few stolen. This causes Chris to panic even more so because that is the only way he is making money for him and his son. Eventually he tracks down the scanners and while he is doing so, he stumbles across the company Dean Witter, a brokerage firm in San Francisco. He soon learns that he can apply to be in the training program and be selected for a job at the company. Chris immediately plans to apply for the program. Soon after though, Chris is evicted from his apartment because he cannot pay the rent. Chris and his son then move into a hotel nearby where they can pay the rent.
After Chris officially applies for the Dean Witter training program, he is notified that he must be the top person in the program of 20 in order to get the position, which Chris thinks is a job. He later finds out that the program is technically an internship which means Chris would not be getting paid. Because of this, Chris thinks about getting out of the program to get a paying job, but he says in it was pledges to work as hard as he can to excel in the internship and eventually get a full-time job at Dean Witter.
This is very hard for Chris still though because he eventually is kicked out of the hotel because he cannot pay the rent. This leaves him and his son homeless. For a couple days they were able to find a spot at the homeless shelter but as Chris tries to excel in the Dean Witter program and sell scanners at the same time he and Christopher are not able to get a spot at the homeless shelter. One night, they sleep in a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) bathroom.
After this, things seem to look up for Chris and Christopher. Chris ends up selling the rest of the scanners that he has, and he is doing very well in the Dean Witter training program. This only lasts for a short time period though, as Gardner’s bank account is garnished by the IRS for his unpaid income taxes, resulting in only $21.33 left in his account.
Chris eventually finishes the program and get awarded a job at Dean Witter. The epilogue reveals that he went on to form his own multimillion-dollar brokerage firm. A theme statement for the movie can be: Happiness is the key to life. Both happiness for yourself and happiness for the ones that you love. This is the only way you can truly live how you want to.