I had a couple of days off this week, so I caught a matinee by myself -- one of my absolute favorite things to do. In fact, I might be doing it again soon given that there are two movies I really want to see.

The first was Gabriele Muccino's The Pursuit of Happyness, which is the real-life story of Chris Gardner, who went from homelessness to a job to becoming a millionaire. And, he's black. And, he was a single father. And, he had just about everything bad happen to him possible.

So, society's stacked against this guy. His wife is on his ass. The world just can't possibly suck any more than this.

However, Gardner -- played by Will Smith -- has his son. That kid is played by Jaden Smith, who happens to be Smith's son in the real world.

How does Gardner overcome his situation? Hard-ass work.

He's really my kind of person in that respect. Hard work, in my estimation, is what separates the ordinary from the great. And, Gardner is a classic up-by-his-bootstraps sort of character, but he never forgets that the reason he's doing what he does is for his kid.

Not going to get into the hows and the whats. Don't want to give anything away. However, what I'd offer you is that Will Smith's acting job is probably worthy of an Academy Award. Seriously. It's one of the better pieces of leading-man acting I've seen in years.

Perhaps it suffers from a bit of Will Smith "playing himself," which Tom Hanks often does. However, it's not hard for the viewer to buy Smith as this Gardner fellow. It's very easy to pull for this guy along the way. And, it's impossible, in my estimation, to deny that the understated way Smith approached the final 15 minutes of the movie was actually a thing of beauty.

It is. I'll say this: The movie was good, even pedestrian at times. However, the ending was artful and brilliant. They could have gone a million ways with it, but they went for subtlety.

Personally, I wish this Gardner fellow had been less about the kid and more about himself. To me, it was almost too good to be true that he was all about the kid. Besides, as a viewer, I want to empathize with the character more, and I don't have kids nor do I have a fascination with them. I like them well enough, but this story could have been just as heartfelt if it had just been Smith playing a man trying to find himself in the world.

But, that's not how Gardner did it.

The movie was really good but not quite great. It was formulaic but not nearly as much as you might think. However, Smith's job was just tremendous. The guy is a gem, and the movie's worth a watch just for the final scene.

Grade: B+

In other news ...

I've posted my Top 25 Songs of 2006 on my MySpace Music blog: click here for the list.

You say, MySpace? What the hell?

Believe it or not, MySpace and MP3.com are kind of in competition in the free music space, meaning I'm again an MP3.com artist. Now, I'm also a MySpace.com artist. My MySpace page is http://www.myspace.com/ryanwelton, and my MP3.com page is http://www.mp3.com/ryanwelton.