An obvious moment didn't need to be elaborated on. While Chris was in the taxi, the audience didn't need to see the inside of his wallet. His facial expression and the shot on the meter were clear indications of his financial struggles. Before that moment, he fought about money and experienced problems with paying for past taxes and rent. Showing the money in wallet interrupted the focus. I guess it works for audiences that need a bit more to understand the scene. In regards to the moment, it was like too much exposition that was already revealed.

The wife, Linda, weighed Gardner down like an anchor. He tried to keep the family together, but she didn't care. She worked, so you can give her that much credit. Linda was a fictional character that's negativity was holding Chris back from succeeding in life.

The real Chris Gardner worked harder. Imagine the movie son and then think that he was really a baby. Gardner didn't have anyone to discuss his problems with. Gardner battled his struggles alone.

Gardner was never selfish. He did everything to make his son happy. A touching moment would've been for Chris to give his son a present. The best gift could've been that action figure that was dropped on the street. This gesture would've showed the kid experiencing the happiness. Underneath all of the struggles, his dad didn't forget about him.

The struggles in the film were worth the final payoff. Everyone knew that Gardner was going to get the job. The partners liked him from the beginning. Gardner was always around to assist in a time of need (donut and coffee runs for manager, $5 bill for partner, Rubik's cube expertise, etc.) The expression on Gardner's face makes any strenuous goal relieving. When one battles through impossible obstacles and succeeds, it makes them feel a sense of accomplishment. The audience felt his happiness in each tear.

Demonstrating his strengths was brilliantly highlighted. In the Rubik's cube news report, only one person, a professor at UCSF, was able to solve the cube riddle in 30 minutes. Gardner performed his cube miracle in a taxi ride, which was less than 30 minutes. The number and focus game of the stock market was revealed when Gardner had to remember the phone number while Wayne distracted him with the Lakers score. The most successful stockbrokers' are able to maintain focus without losing concentration.

The film contained the problems of homelessness. San Francisco hadn't adopted a homeless housing plan until 1988. Shelters could only assist a select few. Homeless people had it tough on the cold streets of San Francisco. Glide Memorial Church served a number of homeless victims. They helped these unfortunate members believe.

Gardner couldn't get a waiter, janitorial and other job. He needed to focus on the main prize. Any other way, he would've not been able to make the dream possibility. If anyone has worked those jobs, one doesn't receive much respect. In addition, these positions are unappreciated and degrading. If Gardner had worked 6 months in one of those jobs, they would be continue be homeless. It takes a lot more than a few dollars to get out of the homeless problem. Sacrificing prepares one for their future. The happiness was a dual dream. The mother was selfish to leave. Chris reassured his son throughout the film that he would take care of him. The bond was strong and one can see how they were related in real life.

Gardner didn't make his son stay on the street for 24 hours. The kid stayed in Day Care during the day. When they failed to obtain homeless shelter in the evening, they found an alternate substitution. People don't notice that when things go wrong, others don't care. Society doesn't care about other people's problems. They only focus on their own wants and desires. You have to separate yourself from the competition. While a candidate may appear to be better on paper with degrees, experience and skills, others that demonstrate more passion tend to accomplish more success. Companies don't want a robot, but an honest, positive and driven person to represent their company. Many companies make mistakes when they turn down the perfect applicant to hire a person that appears more qualified. In the end, the qualified person sends their negativity throughout the workplace.

One would rather sacrifice 6 months of struggles than a lifetime of pain. Success demands struggle. Struggle strengthens the core of any soul. A person that contains discipline excels above the rest. Too many people give up on little things. It takes a special person to continue on the path to success. Life throws us many curve balls and sooner or later, we'll hit one out of the park. Gardner was an example of the top 1% of the richest Americans. He knew not to share his problems with others. He didn't tell all of his tailgating friends about his struggles with his homelessness, his wife leaving and trying to take a chance on success. The strength of the film relied on his ability to avoid sharing problems.

The dictionary term of pursuit is “The act or an instance of chasing.” I was brought up to believe that it was when you stopped giving chase that happiness found you. Happiness is ... cartoon and posters were all the rage and sat alongside Simon le Bon and Nik Kershaw on my bedroom walls. A hugely successful advertising campaign for cigars ran for what seemed like my whole childhood, declaring that happiness is that first puff. Each advert showed a man sat amid a day to day disaster, ranging from flatpack furniture cascading around him to a broken seat in a passport booth. As he falls out of shot Handel's Air on a G String begins to play and he lights up, leaving the viewer with beautiful music, a smoke stream and the slogan Happiness is ... a cigar called Hamlet.

In 2000 this advert was voted eighth most popular advert, despite the subject matter being socially unacceptable in modern Britain. Life was simpler back then. Happiness was found in the little things. Now, we search for them in the big things, the expensive things. Thanks to peer pressure we now need to have the latest bag, biggest car or most expensive watch in order to be happy. The modern trend for property development shows our greed perfectly. During the Second World War, spare rooms housed servicemen and evacuees, while in the Fifties and Sixties only very lucky people ended up with spare rooms, and even then there was always the danger that newlyweds would walk straight down the aisle and back up the stairs while they saved for that all important deposit on a small home of their own. Nowadays, we live in the mistaken belief that a spare house is normal.

Whether it's a chalet in a ski resort, an investment property in Spain or your parents' Right to Buy council house it seems that owning just one property is rather poor form, old dear. It is little wonder that our own children are leading such a vicarious lifestyle. Compared to buying a second, third or fourth property, that extra pair of shoes seems distinctly lacking in frivolity. But is the search for happiness being conducted in the right places?

The phrase "the pursuit of Happiness" is far from new. Even in the American Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson encouraged Americans to strive for "Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." However, it fails to define happiness, leaving us all to decide for ourselves where our happiness lies. I teach a creative writing class for people who were teenagers in the 1960's. Every week, the class produces stories based on their experiences and memories, and their current demeanor can be traced straight back to those earlier days, despite the forty year gap. Those who recall happy childhood memories are pleasant in class and positive in their praise of others.

Those who led harsher teenage years still can't let go. They give very little praise to others and grudgingly accept compliments. Perhaps they feel that there is a limit on "good" things, from compliments to laughter, and if they give too many compliments out then there won't be any left for them. It is a very sad indictment of life in the 21st Century because the people in the class are all potential friends. Unfortunately, for some their early disappointments mean they can overlook a gift of happiness when it is offered. Perhaps it is because it is offered as a free gift that we overlook its worth. Professor Oswald from Warwick University recently took part in the science of happiness project and claims that friendship is hugely valuable. The ability to retrieve happiness from friends is worth £50,000 in economic terms.

So, is happiness to be found in other people, rather than brighter and shinier possessions? It is no accident that people now view themselves less happy now, despite our relative wealth, and the plummeting number of marriages. Speaking on The Happiness Formula programme, Conservative government leader David Cameron posed the question, “how are we going to try and make sure that we don't just make people better off but we make people happier,” He could have looked across the channel to France for some insight. Existentialist and Nobel prize winner for Literature, Albert Camus stated back in 1956, “When you have once seen the glow of happiness on the face of a beloved person, you know that a man can have no vocation but to awaken that light on the faces surrounding him; and you are torn by the thought of the unhappiness and night you cast, by the mere fact of living, in the hearts you encounter.”

Will Smith himself backs this up in his choice of co-stars. His own wife played alongside him in the earlier hit, Prince of Bel-Air, and in his latest film he plays alongside his own son, Jaden Christopher Syre Smith. Their evident happiness at working together, and working with such a "beloved" person rubbed off on the rest of the crew. In newspaper interviews, director Gabrielle Muccino said of Jaden “he had incredible skills. So evident, so strong. I think the chemistry between father and son is amazing. And both of them probably got something from each other during the process of the movie. I was very, very happy to get Jaden.”

In some ways it is easy to seek happiness in the possession of material gains, merely because the emotional pain at their loss is greatly reduced. You may love your car, house or new bag but in reality when the washing machine breaks down we simply replace it. It may cause a nuisance, while repairs are being made, or replacements sought, but it is a mere blip in our life compared to the feelings of losing a loved one. Some people, such as relatives, will never be replaced. When your mother dies you may eventually seek out the qualities you loved in her in your other friendships, but no one will tell you to go and find another mother. The difference comes with lover, ironically the person we anchor much of our love and happiness to.

Those who have lost beloved partners are split between those who seek companionship with almost indecent haste and those who could never imagine finding that level of happiness again. The people in the latter group, when meeting someone new usually say “I wasn't even looking.” The fact that they have experienced real happiness with another person, usually means their new relationship lasts, possibly because they refused to settle for anything less.

On February 3, the Daily Mail ran a story about Maureen Lipman, who has found love three years after losing her husband, playwright Jack Rosenthal. Interviewed before meeting businessman David Gordon she said “It's almost impossible to think of marrying again. But it's in my mind that I might meet someone new. Maybe happiness is not elusive at all - in truth, maybe sometimes we simply forget how to let in it. Occasionally I see a man who has a look I find attractive, that slightly crumpled, world-weary look that Jack had. But you know, I literally wouldn't know where to begin.” Thanks to her new beau, she now claims “it's nice to come out into the world again.”

Luckily, for all who are rebuffing the possibilities of happiness for an elusive dream, there is always retail therapy to fall back on.

I was reluctant to watch this movie due to the fact that it was spoken in a different language; however, with the aid of the subtitles, I realized that the movie spoke out to people of all races, not just the race of the spoken language.

Throughout the movie, the family constantly experienced almost every type of human feeling or condition. I felt that the three feelings most often experienced were as follows: family, survival, and fate. To Live greatly emphasized on the importance of family bonds and values. The family literally had only each other in order to survive. They needed each other, and felt lost without any of them. They were on their own in dealing with the government, their environment, and everyone else around them. As I watched the family eat together, talk together, and find solutions together I thought and imagined my own family and its members and our lives.

I thought about how we all interact with each other every day, and admitted to the fact that a day wouldn't be the same without talking to them. They are always going to be with me, no matter what. They, like the main character's family, help each other with everything and would never leave one another in the dark. Without family, there would be no place called “home.”

Survival was an important part of movie's families' lives. Everything they did was for a reason, mostly for the need to survive. When a mistake was made, or even when someone has bad luck, their survival can disappear in less than a minute, meaning being imprisoned, or even execution. One of the family members in the movie witnessed an execution, and when I saw it for myself too, I could see my family living in that type of situation, a survival-of-the-fittest type of situation. I felt for the family in the movie when one of their members died by accident just because of a small mistake of sleeping in the wrong spot. Like I stated above, survival can disappear in a matter of seconds.

The last human feeling, fate, was a key factor in the lives of each of the people of the family. Everything that happened to them was for a reason, and everything that didn't happen was for a reason. When the main character's house was won out in a teahouse gambling match, the main character would have never been more surprised when the person who won his house was executed later for being a landlord. If it weren't for him and his addiction of gambling, he and probably his whole family would have been publicly executed later. All of this was because of fate and the family's destiny.

As I watched and learned about how fate can intervene with all of the actions you decide to take every day, I accepted the feeling called fate, and formed it within my life. I accepted the fact that everything happens for a reason, and we have very little say in the whole matter.

These three feelings: fate, survival, and family were heavily imposed upon me and my life. The teachings of the movie To Live greatly changed my view on life and its many challenges. I have become a better person; not just because I watched this movie, but because I learned from this movie and applied what it has showed to everything that I do, every single day, including the minute that I am writing this essay. This essay is being written for a reason, and everything happens for a reason.