The Pursuit of Happiness

First and foremost, I'd just like to say that this movie is sad-VERY sad. Also, if you have a nine-to-five job, this movie may not resonate with you, as you might find it challenging to relate.

This cinematic triumph is rich with underlying metaphors that delve into the concept of true freedom and its consequences. Alongside this, it addresses government corruption, power abuse, and explores our society's perceptions in relation to homosexuality and racism. The main protagonist is in a constant struggle against the forces of governement and society, and the system he faces only becomes more relentless in its resistance against him and his righteous endeavors.

However, ultimately, the laws of nature consistently triumph over human-made laws, giving way to anarchy. Unfortunately, anarchy can be a tough pill to swallow at first. Consequently, the movie implies that the main protagonist and his girlfriend will encounter increasingly challenging choices stemming from their own liberties or the absence thereof. The fluctuations in their freedom throughout the story are left wide open for interpretation - a key element contributing to the movie's excellence.

Randy Newman wrote the main title song for the movie, entitled "Let Me Go," which also serves as the end title song, setting the emotional tone for the tragic theme of this film.

I cannot recommend this movie enough; it's one of the greatest classic movies in my opinion. However, one of the defining dramatic features of this cinematic experience is its seemingly inconclusive nature. It leaves the viewer wanting more answers, and that is the only major complaint I can conjure.

Uninvolved New York college student, estranged from his wealthy family and half-heartedly romancing his radical girlfriend, realizes just how empty and directionless his life has become after he accidentally strikes a jaywalker with his car and is sentenced to a year in jail for vehicular manslaughter. Intensely troubling material, based on the book by Thomas Rogers, given low-keyed, matter-of-fact treatment. Michael Sarrazin's dazed and confused young man doesn't mean to buck the system (i.e., the Establishment), necessarily--he refuses to play by the rules because, as he sees it, you have to lie to win. Not wanting to be dishonest to himself, he manages to get in much deeper trouble. Not a surefire crowd-pleaser (especially for this generation), the film is intelligent and smoothly handled, if unable to explore its themes adequately within this milieu. It doesn't want to be a cop-out and have the protagonist become "a better man" by being a model prisoner--and at the same time, it doesn't want to be explosive or dynamic and have the kid get away guilt-free. There's no happy ending (hence the irony of the title), but certainly the circumstances which arise here are thought-provoking. Sarrazin and young, lovely Barbara Hershey are very good; Arthur Hill also excellent as Sarrazin's surprisingly understanding father. The supporting cast is wonderfully filled with now-familiar faces: Sada Thompson, Ralph Waite, David Doyle, Robert Klein, William Devane, Rue McClanahan, Charles Durning. A forgotten picture worth-seeing...and worth discussing afterward. **1/2 from ****

This is an offbeat drama;Michael Sarazin is perfectly cast as the lunar poetic young man ,who seems overtaken by events ,as he was in his lifetime performance in "they shoot horses don't they?".Although he's poisoned with protection,we feel how irrational how misfit he is in the world he lives in:the first sequence of the toy boat (model) and the bluesy lazy song by Randy Newman (heard twice) which fits the movie like a glove is revealing as is the sequence we first meet a member of his family ,the straight auntie ,in the apartment which looks like a time capsule of the early seventies:a Mothers of Invention cover ,a Dylan poster...

Even after what he has done,the whole family sides with him (because their bourgeois honor is at stake),but the hero feels an invisible menace ,something in the air in the country he lives in ,something which remains very vague ;A recurrent feature in mulligan's work :something is threatening in the shadow ;see" the spiral road" "the stalking moon" "the other" and even "baby the rain must fall" ;it's certainly not a one -year sentence which scares him ,but perhaps a society he cannot be part of because he is not prepared to accept a compromise,to be the "spit picture of cousin Terrence".

Two silver spoons are supposedly attending Columbia (both of them are prime community college material). In the greatest challenge of her acting career, Barbara Hershey, who loves to take off her pants, plays a Columbia coed. Please. Things are not much better with the clueless Michael Sarrazin, who makes more bad decisions in two weeks than most people make in a lifetime.

Neither of these characters could even find the room for the SAT test, much less get into any college. Normally, I would say don't waste your time, but watching this film is like watching a 20 car pileup on the highway; you just can't ignore it, even though it is horrible to watch. Robert Klein is very good, though, as is EG Marshall. His son in the film would go on to make Boys in the Band, a great movie. Someone has to make this a midnight movie.

A lot of the films about disaffected youth in America produced at the end of the 60s and the beginning of the 70s were very clichéd and cheaply made by people who really didn't know anything about the subject. They were often clumsily and quickly made to cash in on the period's 'youthquake'.

This is not entirely the case here, though it does have its clumsy clichéd moments. By and large, this film was sensitively executed, about a Columbia student, from an old and wealthy New York family, who accidentally knocks down and kills a woman with his car on a very rainy night and where the tragedy leads him.

Michael Sarrazin is good to look at, as his girlfriend played by Barbara Hershey and he turns in an honest and tender performance. The plot is quite thin but the sensitivity and reasonable depth of many of the various performances, notably by his gentle father (Arthur Hill) and bigoted grandmother (Ruth White), give it substance. It's definitely worth watching.