Born Rich

Worth seeing. I wasn't as offended by the world-view presented as others were. These are very young people grappling with enormous privilege, which unsurprisingly, is its own circle of Hell. Ironically, their struggles are not very different from anyone else's. "What am I going to do with myself?" is something everyone asks. Not having to work is just the other side of having to work. Ultimately, we all still have to make our way in this world. But, one does get a sense of the truism of Thoreau's comment that(paraphrase)"to be born rich is not to be born at all, but rather, still-born." I saw this on HBO and watched Indian Point, another documentary, right after. There was Robert F. Kennedy, another child of privilege, hard at work doing something that matters to him. The individuals who are struggling in Born Rich could benefit by watching him at work and learning how to live.

The documentary Born Rich is an interesting analysis of how people are born into money. In this time of economic crisis, as many of us struggle to pay our bills on a regular basis, it is both interesting and maddening to hear about the problems of the super rich. There are certainly moments in this film where you realize that the absurd society in which these kids were born into has transformed them as they aged, and you feel bad for them.

They start out so innocent as they describe their childhoods, unaware of the massive wall that the upper class has built around them. And as they mature and grow into adulthood the money twists them and burns away all true moral value. And by the end of the film they are portrayed as snotty brats who complain that it's hard for them not to walk into a boutique in Hollywood and buy a $700 handbag. Or how the first two things they think of when entertaining the thought of marriage are: prenuptial agreement and divorce. Oh the challenges we face in life. It all makes for a sickening experience.

And the way they cling to their entitlement is quite interesting as well. One character in the film discusses going to college so that he can make something of himself. He talks about the day that he can rub his parents faces in the fact that he did something on his own and made something of himself. Which would mean something if he weren't attending an ivy- league school on his parents dime. The whole film reeks of self-gratifying posturing that these rich elitists immerse themselves in day after day. It is an interesting film however if you have the stomach for it.

-A. Leonhardt

I avoided watching this film for some time confident it would be a self-indulgent piece of fluff that would grate on my working-class sensibilities. I was wrong. In my humble opinion, Jamie Johnson did a fine job of humanizing himself and his subjects in a way that ,for me, promoted compassion and understanding for persons "different" than myself. Any filmmaker that has the ability and the resources to promote understanding of persons different than ourselves has a talent that hopefully will not be wasted.

Born Rich is a documentary. Having said that, I'm not quite sure how to approach describing this film. I had such a strong reaction to it that it's hard for me to even write this review. Try to view it as I did, with open ears and an open mind, and one may feel a reaction that I myself was surprised to feel- sympathy. "Right..." you're thinking. "Sympathy for those little devils born rich."

No, really. I felt a bit of sympathy and a bit of disgust (just listen to Luke Weil yakking about "little bitch[es]" who won't sign pre-nups) but my true reaction was one of, "Oh... So that's how they live, that's how it is, and if I were one of them, the so-called elite, I'd probably end up a drugged up, boozed-up mess." Why would that life be so bad? The main theme I found running throughout the film was one of despair, especially from the thoughtful and determined filmmaker himself, Jaime Johnson, heir to the the Johnson & Johnson throne. This kid is so honest in his searching, he even gets himself into a bit of legal trouble in the end (I won't ruin the rest of that tidbit for you). One thing that a viewer of modest income will be shocked to learn is that talking about one's wealth, among the fellow wealthy, at least, is taboo. Many of these kids learnt of their parents fortune through the outside world, and not from their parents themselves. I could even understand why some of these kids felt betrayed by this. What I think is disconcerting to most of these kids is that, coming into that knowledge of their own wealth, and whether they realize it or not, they were born without a certain something that every non-rich human on the planet has... that tension of survival, that struggle of having to work to survive, that struggle of knowing that all of our youth and most of our lives are literally wasted on working hard to gain money. The scary thing I thought of while watching this, is that not only is money power, but money is also freedom- and ultimately too much freedom can bring disaster.

The kids in this film are all interesting enough to listen to- they're talking about their "fabulous" lives after all. Most are shallow, mentioning how they have to have that Gucci purse, or those $600 shoes. But a few are thoughtful (Johnson, Ivanka Trump, and Josiah Hornblower, especially) and some downright angry (S.I. IV Newhouse). All said and done, this film is a good look into how these kids function, how they think, and how regardless of wealth, what kind of people they actually are. It goes without saying at the end of the day, if you can't live with yourself, then your life is utterly hopeless.

Bravo to Jamie Johnson for having the guts to "show the dirt in his own backyard" so to speak. The only think worse than the idle rich is to have them mad at you, and still have to socialize with them!

This movie made me appereciate so much more what I have in my own self-made upper-middle class, graduate school educated life. I earned everything I have, and it's made me a richer, deeper, more spiritual person. I don't live every breathing moment with the fear that I'll upset someone and have my money cushion yanked out from under me.

Still, I shook my head sadly as some of these kids (Weil, Bloomberg, the Europeans, the A&P heiress [wait, does A&P even exist anymore?}) really are clueless. They are so oblivious to their narcissism that would otherwise be laughable if one didn't remember that narcissism is really only a mask for crippled self-esteem and an extraordinarily damaged sense of one's purpose in life.

Some of the others, particularly Ivanka Trump, appeared more grounded and in touch with the way the world really works than the aforementioned kids. Kudos to them!

Although I'm not rich, I have a few friends who are from the Palm Beach-Hamptons-have a place on the Upper East Side-old money clan, and although I sometimes don't "get" their lifestyle (a 3 million dollar beach house with Mercedes as a gift from mommy and daddy when one friend graduated college, another who hops his dad's corporate Gulfstream to Brazil every couple of months to have his suits made because he really likes the tailor), I can honestly say that they have worked hard at their own jobs, and are becoming successful in their own right (my beach house friend is a social worker, and her paycheck is donated to a charity that provides college scholarships for low-income kids).

I would like to see a sequel where these kids have to live for three months with no inheritance in a lower class neighborhood, and see who learns the most from it. That would be interesting to watch!