Hollywood show business movies aren’t always bad
NRPLUS Member Article
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ollywood It is known for producing films that portray business owners as bad, brutal, and slimy. (Think of the many villains in James Bond and Leonardo DiCaprio in… The Wolf of Wall Street). But over time, business-oriented films have become more nuanced and delved into stories about startup culture, technological breakthroughs, and the complex ethics of navigating today’s business environment.
In a welcome change of pace, 2023 has given us a series of films that buck old stereotypes and offer audiences valuable lessons about what it takes to build a business.
Here are six of them. The first five are already on streaming video, and the last is in theaters.
air is the story of how underdog shoe company Nike got Michael Jordan’s revolutionary endorsement of the Air Jordan shoe. The film stars Matt Damon as a Nike recruiter, and Ben Affleck as Nike CEO Phil Knight. Both men grew up in liberal Massachusetts and have supported only liberal candidates in their careers, but in this film, they have produced a celebration of American ingenuity, the power of visionary thought, and individual endeavour.
in Tetris, a software engineer becomes obsessed with the video game Tetris, created by a Soviet programmer in his spare time while working for a giant state-owned corporation. It follows the hero’s frantic efforts to secure the handheld video game licensing rights for Japanese company Nintendo – a race against another Western video game company and also against corrupt Russian goons linked to the KGB. As a bonus, we get a closer look at the ugliness of communism and Soviet central planning.
Dumb money It tells the story of how millions of small investors save a dying company, the video game retailer GameStop, from a stock shortage. The scenario focuses on a stockbroker named Keith Gill whose $53,000 investment in GameStop rose to over $48 million during January 2021. By harnessing the power of the online community, Gill led a small financial revolution that frustrated short sellers and saw many amateur investors… They made her rich.
in Flamin Hot, an immigrant janitor named Richard Montañez managed to convince food giant Frito-Lay to create a new Spicy Cheetos flavor. The film showcases the food industry’s dynamism, creativity, and ability to create new products while showcasing how immigration is expanding American culture.
Black Berry This film charts the rise of a small Canadian company to a 45 percent market share in mobile computing and then its decline after the arrival of Steve Jobs’ iPhone. The film depicts the ephemeral nature of so-called “monopoly,” especially in technology. It shows how the entire business landscape can be changed by the failure of a market leader to adapt in the face of competition.
Ferrari It is a biography of Enzo Ferrari, the famous race car driver and automobile entrepreneur. Ferrari started his company bragging that producing cars would “pay for the racing” he loved. But since he was selling less than 100 cars a year, he had to look for a new investor. He did this by winning a prestige race and allowing his business partner wife to roam the production line and enforce his strict standards. Ferrari’s view of racing cars was that “what is ultimately most useful is usually the most beautiful.” The company’s success proved his point.
The 2023 Academy Awards nominations will be announced on January 23. Let’s hope Hollywood “woke up” this year with a nod towards these worthy films. After all, as Craig Gillespie, the Australian director, said Dumb moneysaid L Los Angeles Times“The ability of an outsider to have great success with an idea is a very American thing.” In fact, it’s much more familiar than the story of Gordon Gekko, the psychopath immortalized by director Oliver Stone as the film’s famous villain. Wall Street.
