An Actuary Movie---About Schmidt's

I had a mixed feeling about this movie.

I loved it because it mentioned about Drake (for 5 seconds).
The young guy who replaced the retiring actuary said,
"The Degree from Drake has to be worth something."

I hated it because the film was so slowed and boring to me.
The image of the main character--was just boring and alittle bit depressed.

Perhaps the message of this movie is-
Don't wait til you retire to enjoy life.
Or better yet, don't be a boring actuary, be lively!

Sometimes perception is reality.
And no wonder the SOA needs an image campaign to fight against it.

Resources:
SOA comments on "About Schmidt's"

2 comments:

James said...

If you're looking for a better movie, you could watch "Double Indemnity" made in 1944. It doesn't have actuaries, but it does have Edward G. Robinson playing insurance investigator Barton Keyes.

A quote from the film:

Barton Keyes: You know, you, uh, oughta take a look at the statistics on suicide some time. You might learn a little something about the insurance business.

Edward S. Norton: Mister Keyes, I was RAISED in the insurance business.

Barton Keyes: Yeah, in the front office. Come now, you've never read an actuarial table in your life, have you? Why they've got ten volumes on suicide alone. Suicide by race, by color, by occupation, by sex, by seasons of the year, by time of day. Suicide, how committed: by poison, by firearms, by drowning, by leaps. Suicide by poison, subdivided by TYPES of poison, such as corrosive, irritant, systemic, gaseous, narcotic, alkaloid, protein, and so forth. Suicide by leaps, subdivided by leaps from high places, under the wheels of trains, under the wheels of trucks, under the feet of horses, from STEAMBOATS. But, Mr. Norton: Of all the cases on record, there's not one single case of suicide by leap from the rear end of a moving train. And you know how fast that train was going at the point where the body was found? Fifteen miles an hour. Now how can anybody jump off a slow-moving train like that with any kind of expectation that he would kill himself? No, no soap, Mr. Norton. We're sunk, and we'll have to pay through the nose, and you know it.

James said...

I stand corrected. Barton Keyes is an actuary in the movie:

Barton Keyes: "The job I'm talking about takes brains and integrity...it's the hottest job in the business."