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Ask HN: What movie about entrepreneurship would you recommend?

24 points by ricoche 2 years ago · 41 comments · 1 min read

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I'm not just looking to be entertained, I would like to learn cool stuff about business and get inspired along the way.

Kaibeezy 2 years ago

Is rolling the million-sided dice to win unicorn treats from VC/PE really even about “entrepreneurship”?

These are:

  - Chef
  - Big Night
  - Joy
  - Jerry Maguire
  - The Founder
  - Spare Parts (arguably)
  - The one about the guy who invented intermittent windshield wipers and spent his whole life suing the megacorp that stole his idea
  • mejutoco 2 years ago

    I really like this list. I would only add:

    - Indie game: the movie

    - Moneyball

    • ido 2 years ago

      IG:TM is a controversial choice! It is generally considered very cherry-picked and sets an unrealistic view of the indie game market. It's a fun, feel-good movie no doubt, but I wouldn't recommend treating it as anything more than entertainment.

      • mejutoco 2 years ago

        I saw so much suffering in that movie it never ocurred to me that it could be seen as a feel-good movie. The devs working on the game for 2-3 years while the life was collapsing around them. I found it cathartic but not a happy story.

  • gabrielsroka 2 years ago

    > windshield wiper movie

    Flash of Genius

keiferski 2 years ago

The Social Network is a great film that manages to be inspiring and critical of its subject at the same time.

Margin Call is about finance, not entrepreneurship, but it’s one of my favorite films.

It only lasted a season or two, but How to Make it in America was pretty inspiring as well.

robsun 2 years ago

"Silicon Valley". It's not a movie, but a documentary TV series about startup scene in '00 ;)

vimy 2 years ago

The Founder. Not a movie but Halt and Catch Fire was really great.

  • Kaibeezy 2 years ago

    The Founder really shows the sort of relentless idea-filtering and -selection process an entrepreneur has to commit to. Could he have been a bit nicer? Probably not a high correlation for the personality type that’s comfortable with culling.

blockwriter 2 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitzcarraldo

  • kouru225 2 years ago

    Also gotta recommend Burden of Dreams, the making of Fitzcarraldo, which is arguably an even crazier story

qzuipo 2 years ago

"Breaking Bad". Not a movie but series.

Replace drug with any other product and the ingenuity of Walter White to scale the operations, hiring people, shifting operations to different locations, responding to competition makes it interesting.

  • splintercell 2 years ago

    An amazing TV series about a talented young man who bails out on his ambitions, and becomes a family man, only to grow old at an unsatisfying job, and finding himself facing his mortality, at which point he decides to change his life and achieves his true potential.

  • BjoernKW 2 years ago

    "Top Boy" qualifies as well in that respect (a new, and quite likely final, season has just been released). While not exactly as well-known as "Breaking Bad", it not only offers an insightful perspective on the drug trade itself but also on a specific London subculture.

    Fundamentally, that show is about business and entrepreneurship. Sure, the industry might seem more than just a little shady and its methods often are ruthless, but basic business principles still apply (to quote one of the main characters: "Buy cheap, sell dear.").

shrimp_emoji 2 years ago

The Aviator (2004)

Also the https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_Shrugged_(film_series)

  • defrost 2 years ago

    Not exactly good investment advice there though:

        The trilogy received predominantly negative critic reviews and the aggregate USA box office is just under $9 million, with each film performing worse than the last on both accounts.
    
    Atlas Shruugged trilogy represents $35 million in, 9 million return and no recognition of merit.
kouru225 2 years ago

McCabe and Mrs Miller is a great movie about creating a prostitution business in the Wild West.

There Will Be Blood also (for obvious reasons)

sourabh03agr 2 years ago

The founder and Air are must watch. Also, Guru (Bollywood) is a nice one - story of Dhirubhai Ambani, the man who founded Reliance industries

Gooblebrai 2 years ago

Halt and Catch Fire

Seriously underrated. Based on the 80s.The most realistic drama about entrepreneurship and relationships I've ever watched.

dp-hackernews 2 years ago

StartUp (TV Series)

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt5028002/

franz68 2 years ago

The short series about Spotify and ofc The Founder

throwaway167 2 years ago

Kitchen Nightmares, UK version.

Operations, People, Marketing, Sane decision making, Passion.

But not the US version. That's just drama.

muzani 2 years ago

Riot On! It's an old story about the pre-touchphone days, but the same lessons still carry over.

Austin_Conlon 2 years ago

The documentary on General Magic.

world2vec 2 years ago

"Straight Outta Compton" (2015).

joshxyz 2 years ago

- Narcos (about Pablo Escobar)

- Super Pumped (about Uber)

fruity231 2 years ago

How to make money selling drugs (2012), followed by Narconomics: How To Run a Drug Cartel book.

luxpir 2 years ago

Pi. The insanity but absolute need to push on with the mission.

caeciliusest 2 years ago

Tetris

readyplayernull 2 years ago

I found The Profit series to be inspiring.

rasz 2 years ago

Antitrust from 2001, its about Github.

rahimnathwani 2 years ago

The Bridge to Nowhere

Lord of War

Boiler Room

I second the other recommendation for Tetris.

rurban 2 years ago

Startup, the documentary

hulitu 2 years ago

- Office space

-The 12 chairs

MrFots 2 years ago

The Toy

Capitalism, Cronyism, sticktoitiveness, and, for the right price, you can buy anything.

kb10g 2 years ago

Gattaca 1997

singleshot_ 2 years ago

Primer

elevaet 2 years ago

Primer!

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