The Conquest of Happiness
Ask yourself if you’re really happy and you might be surprised at what you find. Ask several people at various points in their lives and you will get a different answer. This is the premise behind the film “13 Conversations about One Thing”, a touching, poignant and in some moments, deeply philosophical film, directed by Jill Sprecher. The film interweaves five contemporary stories into a single narrative. It deals with the profound, often unintentional impact that people have on one another, while searching for a more meaningful and happier existence. As the characters lives collide, mesh, and bounce off one another we see how their lives are linked in moments of highs and lows. The movie finds connections between people who think they are strangers, finding the answer to one person’s problem in the question raised by another.
In the opening scene in the film, we get a glimpse of Walkers life, a Columbia University physics professor whose life has been disrupted by an assault. His wife, Patricia, seems more concerned than he is. At the dinner table, the two barely exchange a word. The atmosphere is one of utter boredom and contempt. The recent assault seems to affect him and his wife asks him, “What is it that you want?” his response sets up the rest of the film. “I want what everyone wants”, he says, “to experience life, to wake up enthused, to be happy”. The whole randomness of the event has brought to his attention his general unhappiness and boredom with his routine life. So, to compensate, he walks out on his wife and has an affair with a colleague. The affair is not the point. Walker is going through the emotions, as do most of us. He believes that this is how you find happiness. People tend to seek happiness from others. Instead of focusing on ourselves, we tend to compensate for our unhappiness by doing things that are out of