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Written by McClatchy-Tribune
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Saturday, 16 December 2006 |
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‘The Pursuit
of Happyness’
4 of 5 stars
Will Smith, Jaden Smith, James Karen, Thandie Newton
PG-13 / 1 hr. 57 mins. / Carmike 10, Cinemark 16, Cinemark Greeley Mall, Metrolux 14
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Hope can be cruel. It’s that thing you still hang onto even after reason tells you the game is over. Having a little hope can be more wrenching than the simple act of giving up.
Hope is a vicious mistress to Chris Gardner. It’s that one sale that can let him pay the rent; that one bus that he just missed for the job interview with a brokerage house; the one deal he is five minutes too late to make.
Hope keeps him going. But hope keeps putting banana peels on the stairs he tumbles down in “the pursuit of happiness.”
Or in this case, “The Pursuit of Happyness.” It’s a poignant but relatively dry-eyed holiday weeper about a single dad (Will Smith) who always seems half a step away from success, even as his life spirals into homelessness.
A feel-good movie, you ask? Why, yes. But first you’ve got to feel miserable. And more miserable. By degrees. This movie lets its hero (a real person) take one step forward, always followed by two steps back. It’s wrenching that way.
Chris is peddling a bulky, suitcase-portable bone-density scanner, doctor to doctor. He’s sunk all the family money into these things. And virtually nobody wants one.
So his wife (Thandie Newton, angry, defeated, magnificent) leaves him. He won’t let her take his son. He was 28 before he met his own father.
He spots a man getting out of a sports car and finds out what the guy does for a living. You don’t need a college degree to be a stock broker. You need to be “good with numbers and with people.”
Chris is. But his timing is terrible.
If only he can make an appointment to apply for a Dean Witter internship. If only he can con the guy who hands out those internships into letting him take a cab ride with him. If only he can solve the guy’s new toy, a Rubik’s Cube (this is set in 1981) and impress him. If only he can get away from the cabbie he can’t afford to pay. If only the internship paid.
Christopher, his 5-year-old (Jaden Smith, Will’s kid with Jada Pinkett Smith), can’t quite figure out what Dad is doing or why they keep sinking further and further into the abyss. Eviction after eviction, stumbling through the subway with everything they own in a suitcase, Chris does not let on to his son that they’ve hit bottom.
The learning curve Chris goes through, and passes on to his son, reaches for maudlin but never quite gets there.
But for anybody who’s ever been at the bottom, or feared they were headed there, it’s a reminder that there’s no guarantee of luck or happiness — just the right to pursue it. | Only registered users can write comments.
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|  | "Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only truth." | |
|  | We're not that bright, even though in our own little world, we're geniuses. We like 80s hair bands and one-hit wonders, but among us we have respectable tastes, too. Metallica, Iron Maiden, U2. Pursuit of all things trivial is a lifestyle, not just a game. We like some sports, love other sports, and can find something to say about anything. We watch TV and movies and we've read a book or two, even a few classics (Yes, Classic Comics count!)
We call it insight, you call it what you will. | |
|  | Felix Wong is an outdoor enthusiast living in Fort Collins. A mechanical engineer by day, he is especially passionate about bicycling, running, and backpacking. | |
|  | Hola Amigos! I'm Sandra. I like to believe that people are 70 percent good and 30 percent dumb. I'm stickin to that story. Reading this blog might make you want to be good, but probably just dumb. | |
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I am a recent college graduate of Minnesota State University Moorhead. After recieving my B.A. in English and Mass Communications this past August I moved down to Colorado.
I enjoy long walks on the beach, candlelight dinners, and heavy metal. My hobbies include reading and writing, music, movies, and getting drunk. Some of my favorite contemporary authors include Bret Easton Ellis, Chuck Palahniuk, and Kurt Vonnegut. My top movies are anything directed by Kubrick. I enjoy listening to anything that rocks.
Right now I am just trying to get to know Colorado and FoCo better. Mostly in order to find the best drink specials on each day that ends in Y. So if you know where I can get a cheap drunk on, let me know!
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| | My name is Michelle Turley and I'm 28 years old. I live in Severance with my hubbie, Brandon. We have 2 dogs and a cat. We enjoy camping, four-wheeling, and just being in the mountains. I like to cook, clean (go figure), flea market, and play poker. I have so much to say about poker... | |
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