chris gardner on the pursuit of happiness

Of the two more recent movies, this is easier to see in About Schmidt.

John Huston was of course saying the same thing in Treasure of the Sierra Madre. The lines are about how you treat them, which also has to do with the reason why they are both “impostors” - namely, that neither is ever quite unalloyed with its opposite, however wonderful or horrible it may seem at the time - which is what I think both Messrs Payne and Muccino are saying in their respective codas.

I hope it is not necessary to point out that neither Mr Muccino nor Alexander Payne, the director of About Schmidt, nor Rudyard Kipling would ever say that Triumph and Disaster are the same. If you can meet with Triumph and DisasterĪnd treat those two impostors just the same. This evening, I'd like to quote a couple of additional lines from the same poem,

to illustrate a point about luck and risk and the character it takes to deal with both. Those of you who were here to watch Treasure of the Sierra Madre with us a few weeks ago may remember that on that occasion, I quoted in my talk some lines from Kipling's If. Both movies offer a coda to the emotional arc of their narrative which, I think, alters their meaning significantly. Just as Schmidt doesn't quite end with the hero's expression of the firm and unshakable opinion that his life has been a failure, so Pursuit doesn't quite end with the hero's hard work and sacrifice being rewarded at last. Just as I thought that About Schmidt was more than its apparently depressing ending, so I think The Pursuit of Happyness is more than its inspirational ending. But I would like to downplay both extremes just a little. If you thought so, this week's movie will be the antidote, since it is uplifting, even inspirational, unless you are a certain kind of person that I will mention in a moment. Once again, before we move on to a discussion of tonight's film, the based-on-a-true-story Pursuit of Happyness by Gabriele Muccino and starring Will Smith, I want to look back for just a moment to the view, expressed by some during the discussion last week, that About Schmidt was a depressing movie. Before showing this movie, Mr.Bowman spoke for a few minutes about it and the series as a whole as follows. This summerEPPC Resident Scholar James Bowmanhas been presenting, on behalf of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the Hudson Institute in Washington, a series of six films on the general theme of “The Pursuit of Happiness.” The sixth and final film in the series, itself titled The Pursuit of Happyness, by Gabriele Muccino and starring Will Smith, Thandie Newton and Jaden Smith, was shown on Tuesday, August 3rd.

Chris gardner on the pursuit of happiness