Lack of Hollywood varnish makes 'Happyness' shine

The word happyness is painted on a mural outside a storefront day care in San Francisco's Chinatown. That misspelling gives the heart-wrenching The Pursuit of Happyness its title. And it functions as a daily reminder to Chris Gardner - the hard-luck hero wonderfully played by Will Smith - that his efforts to achieve some level of contentment and security may not, and may never, pan out.

Based on a true story (and put on its Hollywood path after a profile of the real Chris Gardner appeared on ABC's 20/20), The Pursuit of Happyness is not your standard tale of overcoming obstacles, following one's dreams, and achieving success.

All of that happens, but the struggles rarely have been depicted in such palpable, painful, poignant strokes. You'd have to go back to post-Depression classics like The Grapes of Wrath or Meet John Doe to find a studio endeavor that describes the world of soup kitchens and shelters, poverty and misfortune, with such plain, grim honesty.

Set in 1981 and narrated by Smith's Gardner in a series of wry, rearview-mirror monologues (the voice-over helps to soften the blows), the story is a nightmare of humiliation and homelessness. Gardner is a salesman, toting a portable bone density scanner around town - a gizmo with some merit, but not enough to persuade most medicos to pay its formidable price tag. His wife, Linda (Thandie Newton), works double shifts to try to make ends meet, but the ends aren't coming close: Behind on the rent, late paying the IRS, with money owed to the day care attended by their 5-year-old (Smith's real-life son, Jaden Christopher Syre Smith - a natural!), the family's world is falling apart.

And then Linda decides to leave.

And Gardner, in a desperate last hope, applies for an internship at a stock brokerage - no salary, and just a 1-in-20 shot of a job if he makes it through the intensive, super-competitive program.

Through a series of mishaps and mistakes (one: leaving your scanner with a hippie street musician), Gardner and his son, Chris Jr., are tossed from their apartment, and then from a low-rent motel. Nights are spent in a church shelter, if they make the cutoff in a block-long line of homeless people. Or by riding the subway. Or - in one of the movie's most stark and emotional moments - locked in a public toilet.

The Pursuit of Happyness was written by Steven Conrad (Wrestling Ernest Hemingway, The Weather Man) and directed by Gabriele Muccino, the Italian filmmaker behind the original (and far better) version of The Last Kiss. The scenes in the Gardners' apartment - before Linda exits, before the landlord evicts - are shot in a grainy, hand-held style that screams art house. But the streets of San Francisco have a studio sheen, as does the Dean Witter trading room and its well-appointed offices. BART, the Bay Area's underground rail system, looks as bright and clean as a spring day.

All of which makes Gardner's where's-our-next-meal-coming-from despair doubly horrible.

A movie star who can slip easily into high-beam mode, Smith gives a restrained and nuanced turn. In a suit that seems to fit him less and less well as his circumstances turn from bad to worse, the actor is a walking bundle of woe and worry - and resilience. The relationship between Chris and his diminutive namesake is at the core of the film - the determination to be there for his son, no matter what; the mentoring, the pair's goofy, lovely banter. And Smith and his bright-eyed boy pull it off brilliantly.

If The Pursuit of Happyness, with its allusions to Thomas Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence, has a problem, it's one that's at the heart of our society, at the core of capitalism: the one that equates monetary success with happiness.

But after the Job-ian odyssey of Chris Gardner - trying to prove himself and provide for his son - such rewards seem well-deserved.

Contact movie critic Steven Rea at 215-854-5629 or srea@phillynews.com. Read his recent work at http://go.philly.com/stevenrea.

The Pursuit of Happyness *** 1/2 (out of four stars)

Produced by Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal, Steve Tisch, James Lassiter and Will Smith, directed by Gabriele Muccino, written by Steven Conrad, photography by Phedon Papamichael, music by Andrea Guerra, distributed by Columbia Pictures.

Running time: 1 hour, 57 mins.

Chris Gardner. . . Will Smith

Christopher. . . Jaden Christopher Syre Smith

Linda. . . Thandie Newton

Jay Twistle. . . Brian Howe

Parent's guide: PG-13 (profanity, adult themes)

Playing at: area theaters