The Company Men

Thanks to Netflix I was recently able to watch the 2010 film The Company Men.  I found the movie interesting on a number of levels and decided to take a few minutes to work through my thoughts.  I’ll try to keep this post reasonably spoiler free with only general discussions of themes and character arcs but no specific plot details.

I have to start this off by saying that I like the film.  Had a seen it last year I don’t think that it would have made my top 10 list but it would have been an honorable mention.  That being said, the main focus of my contemplation after seeing the film is not about the quality or my enjoyment of the movie at all.  What I am interested in is the content of the film, and more specifically the decision to focus on Ben Affleck, Tommy Lee Jones, and Chris Cooper’s characters. 

The film runs as both a commentary on the 2008 to present financial crisis as well as a character study of three employees of a Fortune 500 company that each have a personal crisis based on uncertain employment prospects.  The difference between this movie and other movies—both those based on the current crisis and ones dealing with joblessness in general—is that our three main characters are rich.  Affleck and Cooper play characters who gross low six figures and Jones’ character is likely a millionaire.    At one point in the movie the main character (played by Affleck) scoffs at a $60,000.00 a year job.  I would kill for a job that paid that well! 

You might think that the film’s focus on upper class employees would be to its detriment but to me the film rang as true as if we were following any number of day laborers that were also being hit by layoffs.  What this film connects with is the fact that a viewer’s empathy with a character is connected with witnessing a true emotional problem in their lives.  With Affleck it is the fact that he was living so close to his means that he has no real nest egg.  For Cooper it is the fact that he has given his professional life over to a company that in the end does not even recognize him as a person.  Lastly, for Jones it is about recognizing in himself that he threw away a part of himself to help his friend and a company he helped to create flourish.  For all the important work these characters did for the company they received great salaries but nothing else.  They believed that they were important to the company but in the end all the company is concerned about is the price of its stock.

A lot of times people lose sight of the line where their professional and social lives separate.  What this movie seems to say is that at the end of the day success and money are important but they are not worth your life.  By the end of the movie some of these characters learn that important lesson.  The ones that stay in the professional world seem to be approaching it with a new sense of self.  They are throwing themselves back into the work but not at the cost of their families and personal motivations.

Feel free to sound off in the comments.  I’m interested to hear if anyone was unable to connect with the characters because of the financial aspect.