Review of … And the Pursuit of Happiness (1986) by Maarrk H — 01 Sep 2009

Can immigrants achieve the material well-being and individual freedom the American Dream promises in exchange for hard work? Malle finds the answer is mostly affirmative, without ever being idealistic, though the path is not the same for all. Those foreigners most enterprising and skilled are proud to call the U.S. home, thankful for the realized opportunity to make their own success. Most start at the bottom, but eventually succeed academically or build companies and prosper, passing the acquired social capital on to their mostly-Americanized children. Others drift across the border fleeing poverty and lack of work, succumbing to hard physical labor and squalid living conditions for a menial improvement in wage. Nevertheless, America draws these people from all walks because the incentive is the same: it provides a better life, though it appears to do so to varying degrees.

The film only briefly touches on the problem of multicultural policy (black residents of a housing complex are put off by the influx of Vietnamese immigrants and the pungent aroma of their cuisine), but at least portrays the "melting pot" as somewhat of a myth. American-born kindergarteners of immigrants are taught their parents' native tongue, and everywhere people seem to maintain the culture of their homeland, be it Cubans celebrating in the streets of Miami, Muslims praying at a mosque in Texas, or the Hindu temple in one family's suburban kitchen.