The Intern

The Intern

Anne Hathaway’s movies never fail to mesmerize me, and The Intern is one of them. Apart from the amazing cast of the movie, who played their roles perfectly, the storyline is simple, unique, humorous, to the point, and most importantly sends an impactful message about how age isn’t really a significant barrier to what you want to achieve in life. It has wormed its way to my favourite movie list while I was watching it.

Jules Osten created an online fashion company called ‘About The Fit’, which turned into a successful one within a period of just 18 months. A graduate from Harvard business school, she is portrayed as the company’s workaholic CEO. As part of a community outreach programme, they decide to hire a senior intern. Ben, a 70-year-old widower who previously used to work at a phone company DEX One, decides to apply for the job. Impressed by his optimistic attitude and eagerness to learn, they select him as one of the 4 hired, and is assigned to work under Jules. Having already been reluctant to have someone as old as him working as an intern with her, she doesn’t involve Ben with her work as she should do. Not disheartened by it, he tries to help her without getting in the way, cleans the messy desk which she had strongly wanted cleaned, gives advice to his fellow young colleagues, and takes the role of her driver. After having a heart-to-heart conversation late at the office, Jules finds a friend in him, and realizes she’s been wrong about him all along. Outside the company, Jules is a mom to Paige, and wife to Matt, who to help her set the company, takes the role of a stay-at-home dad willingly.

Watching Jules relent to the pressure she faces from the company’s investors to replace her as the CEO of her own company is quite saddening. They were apprehensive about how she would lead the company, worried by the fact that a start-up had become a juggernaut in a short period of time. She agrees to hire an experienced person for the position to spend more time with her family and save her marriage, as her professional responsibilities would then reduce as a consequence. Having watched the passion Jules has for her company, the amount of work she has put into making it what it is, Ben, knowing why she’s actually considering it, advises her to not step down as the CEO for any reasons, as that would keep questioning her authority. Matt later apologises for his actions, and encourages her to run her company on her own terms. The way Ben understands, respects, admires Jules throughout the movie is really beautiful to watch. I realised how much support from the people around you matters in life. At times, we just need one hug, or just one person to tell us we can do it, or everything will be alright. The kind of optimism Ben shows is inspiring. The one takeaway for me from the movie was that when you’re at a crossroad, you have to do what feels right, like Ben said, ‘You are never wrong to do the right thing’. Can't wait to watch the Hindi adaptation of the movie!