Popcorn and Inspiration: ‘The Pursuit of Happyness’: Biopic About Self-Determination and Self-Reliance

Father and son Will and Jaden Smith play father and son in a story of a man working hard to achieve his dream. Sony Pictures Releasing

PG-13 | 1h 57min | Biography, Drama | 15 December 2006 (USA)

Serendipity is astounding. I recently began watching a series of motivational videos, and once in a while they feature a black gentleman with a distinctively deep voice, but I never see his name. One of the things he says over and over is that you have to do things yourself because the cavalry isn’t coming to save you. I kept wondering why they’d intertwine his parts of the videos with scenes from a movie featuring Will Smith and his son Jaden. Curious, I looked up Smith’s filmography (well, scoured through it, actually) and found out that the film was titled “The Pursuit of Happyness.” I also discovered that it’s a biographical piece covering the rags-to-riches life of a man named Chris Gardner.