In this Lunch and Earn episode, Evan Carmichael answers a viewer's request for motivational movies by sharing the five films that have most influenced his entrepreneurial mindset. He explains how each movie—Jobs, The Pursuit of Happyness, Moneyball, Any Given Sunday, and Seabiscuit—provided a distinct lesson: defining purpose, relentless perseverance, creative problem‑solving with limited resources, daily motivation through a powerful speech, and the power of collective belief. Carmichael also recounts a former favorite, Boiler Room, and why he removed it from his list after realizing its aggressive sales philosophy conflicted with his evolved approach. Throughout, he ties personal anecdotes (e.g., immediate action after watching Jobs, reciting Al Pacino’s speech with a business partner) to concrete business behaviors, and invites viewers to share their own must‑watch entrepreneurial films.
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What are my favorite top 5 movies for entrepreneurs? I'm going to answer that question in today's episode of Lunch and Earn. So I recently got asked a question from one of my YouTube viewers, love you guys, Moroccan Gamer Geek, who wrote in to say, "Can you talk about some motivational movies please, or just write them down if you don't have time?" So I had a hard time with this one and was starting to think, which are the movies that I really love and enjoy, because I get a lot out of movies and almost every movie that I watch, I'm always thinking about my business and my life and try to pull a piece of it that I might be able to apply. But for this video, I'm gonna share with you the 5 ones that have had, I think, the biggest impact on my business. Number 1 is Jobs starring Ashton Kutcher. And this movie came to me at the right time. I was always a Steve Jobs fan, but I was going through a time at the moment in my life where I was trying to figure out what do I stand for with my business, what are the big things that I wanna accomplish. I was trying to find my one word, what eventually became my one word of believe. And I saw the movie first with my wife, and then I saw it with a colleague of mine and a friend. And after watching that movie the first time, I made the decision that I need to go out and do something bigger. It really inspired me, I wanted to do something more. I wanted people to hit my website and watch my videos and respond with my social media posts and feel, feel something that matters. I wanted everybody to come away from every video that they watch inspired and wanted to take action, because that was the feeling I got from leaving that movie, and I wanted to be able to instill that in other people. And immediately I made appointments with two friends of mine and wanted to do a big project with them. And I didn't wait until, you know, the next night or the next day. I did it on the spot, leaving the theater while I had my, my moment of boldness from watching the movie. And I set up meetings with both of them, and one of them came on board. The other one didn't work out. One of them came on board and has been an amazing contributor to my business since. And so, uh, it's one of my all-time favorite movies for entrepreneurs. Number 2 for me was Pursuit of Happiness, uh, starring Will Smith. And that movie really taught me about not giving up. He was a guy who was faced with incredible odds, and Chris Gardner, and he was a single dad and he was homeless and trying to look after his son and try to just build a positive life. And he wanted to be a stockbroker and you know, just got kicked and punched in the gut over and over and over and over again and just stuck to his dream and never gave up and eventually turned it around, became a millionaire, started living his life, you know, built the dream life for himself. And, you know, no matter what you're going through right now in your life, it probably is not as bad as what Chris Gardner had from going from a homeless single dad. And if he could stick on his dream and he could continue to plow through every single day. Just gives me the courage and the motivation, inspiration to say I can do it too, and hopefully you can as well. So I highly recommend watching that movie. Number 3 is Moneyball, and it stars Brad Pitt, and I was a fan of the book by Michael Lewis. And what it teaches you is to be creative and to think outside the box and do things that are different because you are forced to be constrained by your resources. It's a story of Billy Beane, who's the general manager of the Oakland Athletics, and it was a team that had very little money, and they're trying to compete with the New York Yankees and the big teams in baseball, and they couldn't do it by outspending. And I think it's the same thing with you as an entrepreneur, right? You've got your business, you're taking on the New York Yankees in your industry, the big players. You're not going to do it by taking out Super Bowl commercials and by investing a lot of money in magazine advertising and TV ads, right? You can't do it the same way they do it. And so the lack of resources forces you to be creative and think outside the zone. And so that's what I really loved about it. It was very entrepreneurial to me and one of my favorite movies. Number 4 is Any Given Sunday. And the movie itself is just okay, but it's famous for this one epic speech by Al Pacino that I remember when I had my company and I was struggling, I would have that on at least once a day to get me fired up and excited to go out and do something important with my business. I had a business partner at the time in that company and we would recite the lines to each other, and it just was a fun way to keep ourselves motivated and amped up. And I think the movie itself, again, was just okay, but it's worth watching just that one clip of Al Pacino if you need some motivation to get going for the day. And number 5 is Seabiscuit. And that's because the movie is all about believe. It's about this horse that was supposed to do well that never did well and was just thrown and cast aside. It's about this trainer that used to be a champion and that nobody wanted to deal with. It's about this jockey that is too big, that nobody thinks can ever be a jockey. It's about this owner that is down on his luck. And all of these people who everybody has discounted and said they're has-beens and they're never gonna make it, find each other somehow and then create history by winning a whole bunch of races. And it's based on a true story. And I've seen that movie probably 30 times. It's my favorite movie. and I encourage you to go check it out. All about belief, and it's called Seabiscuit. And before wrapping up, I wanted to quickly talk about one movie called Boiler Room. And when I was a younger entrepreneur, I loved this movie, but it's come off my list. I liked how Ben Affleck came in and would tell the sales associates about selling, and he would say— what did he say? He said that a sale is always made. He would say that either you convince somebody why they need to buy from you, or they convince you on a reason why they don't need to. Either way, a sale is made. And that got me all excited and fired up. And I thought that was how you did business, through cold calling and forcing people to buy from you and convincing them that you had the right product for them. And as I've grown older, I've come to understand that it's not like that almost at all. And that's one of the least effective ways to actually grow your business. And so it's fallen off my top 5 list. So I hope that helped. Thank you guys so much for watching. I'd love to know from you, what is your favorite movie that all entrepreneurs must watch Leave it in the comments below. I'm curious to find out, and I'm gonna join in the discussion. Thank you so much for watching. Continue to believe, and I'll see you soon.
