Smith Month - Mini Review: The Pursuit of Happyness

I’ve decided to save my sanity and limit the Will Smith Oscar baiting movies to this one and Collateral Beauty. But I’ve chosen this one to introduce another member of the Smith family we’ll be looking at a couple more time. May I introduce Mr Jaden Smith… You know the guy who tweets this sh*t

No Jaden, Baby Geniuses is cr*ppy movie series, not a representation of Real Life

At a mere 8 years old (probably younger during production) and with only a cameo in Men in Black II under his belt, young Jaden would have a starring role in this, the Pursuit of Happyness

Released in 2006, the movie had a decent reception with 67% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and an average 8/10 on IMDb. The movie was profitable, earning over $300m on its $55m budget. But does it hold up? Here are my thoughts.

Based on true events, our story follows Chris Garner (Will Smith), he invested his life savings rather foolishly into some medical equipment he’s now struggling to sell. Behind on rent, his wife Linda (Thandie Newton) elects to leave him, attending a new job in a restaurant in New York. Chris insists his son (Jaden Smith) stay with him, despite barely having the means to look after him.

His only hope comes in a chance meeting with Jay Twistle (Brian Howe) who he impresses with the magic of a rubik’s cube. Impressed enough, he’s given an internship at a stock broker’s, but it’s highly competitive with only one job at the end, and there’s no salary to support him. Alone, James must take care of his son, as at every twist and turn, fate conspires against him.

Because I’m not entirely sure what was changed from real life events, it’s hard to judge the storytelling. But there are few things that bugged me a little from a narrative perspective. The first being the medical devices. For the few months he was behind on rent, he was having trouble selling them but the moment he starts training to be a stock broker, when he has less time on his hands, he was able to sell all of them and it was only down to a tax raid that he was unable to afford rent. It just seems a little too convenient.

Add to that the dynamic between Chris and his wife, she initially leaves, taking their son with her, Chris then takes his son back after day-care (which he can still afford throughout the movie somehow) and is somehow looking after him until he’s arrested for failing to pay for parking tickets and has to spend the night in jail. During this time, he gets Linda to look after him, and she brings him back before announcing her leaving. Then there’s a conversation between them where Chris say “you can’t look after him” – this is perplexing to me because I’ve seen little evidence to sustain that, in fact she seemed better at it than him. And her resigning to that is also perplexing, either there is something we don’t know or she’s just leaving alone to spite him at this point. It’s never really addressed.

My other, more minor gripe with the story is the narration, it really, really wasn’t necessary and added nothing.

So, with those details omitted, we do have something quite interesting here. A story of someone rising from lowly beginnings through hard work, and perseverance and the bond between him and his son. It is a good story, the real Gardner was right when he said he thought his story had cinematic potential. We all root for the underdog, and it’s hard not to feel sorry for all of Gardner’s suffering through the movie.

Will Smith pulls in one of the best performances we’re going to see in this theme month, he puts in a restrained performance compared to some other roles but it works fantastically, he was nominated for an academy award for his role here and I see why. As for Jaden, his acting is a little off, but it’s to be expected off a kid with little acting experience, but what saves it is the bond between him and his father. They sell it as a bond between father and son because… that’s exactly what it is. It’s a shame his role doesn’t have a little more meat to it, but we’ve got After Earth coming up so… let’s look forward to that then.

The Pursuit of Happyness is a story of an underdog rising through the obstacles to become the best he can be, and I respect a story like that. It may lean a little on the contrived at points, but that’s not enough to overshadow Will's fantastic performance and the chemistry between him and his son.

Rating 75/100