Jason Gregg likes The Social Network.
I know it is pretentious of me to place my name in the title of my review. But, after leaving David Fincher’s film “The Social Network,” I could only feel arrogant and overly confident. The movie has a strong, young cast of characters who play their roles with enormous confidence that radiates off of the screen.
Jesse Eisenberg plays Mark Zuckerberg, the co-founder of Facebook, with such unwarranted cockiness I wanted to punch him in his smug little face in the first 10 minutes. The film brings us closer to see more than the hyper-intelligent boy genius and by the end, I wanted to add him as a friend on Facebook or at least “like” him.
David Fincher (the director of “Fight Club,” “Seven”) and his screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (screenwriter for “The West Wing,” “Charlie Wilson’s War”) based the movie on the book “The Accidental Billionaires” by Ben Mezrich. Facebook and the actual Mark Zuckerberg wanted nothing to do with the film.
The story begins in 2003 at a bar where Mark is being dumped by his girlfriend, Erica Albright (played by Rooney Mara). This one opening scene sets the over-analytical persona of Mark for the entire film. Is he arrogant? A bit. Is he too smart for his own good? Definitely. Does he understand that his intelligence can make others feel inferior? Only after he sees what he has done does he feel any type of remorse or regret.
After being dumped, a hurt Mark goes back to his dorm, has a few drinks and starts blogging about how much he despises his new ex-girlfriend. All in one night he develops a Web site where Harvard classmates can rate the attractiveness of other students and the site crashes Harvard’s computer network. Not bad for a night’s work.
Through his actions, Mark garners the attention of a set of twins, Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (both played by Armie Hammer), who are starting their own Web site similar to MySpace and Friendster. They hire Mark to help develop the site and grow it into something that they could never do on their own. And here’s where the trouble begins. Mark begins to play both sides of the field to borrow startup money from his best friend, Eduardo Saverin (played by Andrew Garfield), and at the same time he takes the Winklevoss’ initial idea to develop his own site.
Since Mark Zuckerberg (the actual guy) and Facebook have distanced themselves from the film, it has intrigued many people to want to know more. That is going to be the driving force behind the box office sales. To better illustrate this point, there is a scene in the film where Zuckerberg and Eduardo meet with the founder of Napster, Sean Parker (played by Justin Timberlake. Added sidebar: I think it is great that Fincher had someone from the music industry play the guy who was responsible for ripping off that same industry). In this scene, the trio is discussing how to market Facebook. Eduardo wants to get advertisers on board ASAP while Mark and Sean wants to let Facebook grow before they start trying to make money off the deal. Let the users determine the growth of the product. Fincher and Sorkin did the exact same thing with the promotion of this film. If Facebook said yes to the film then it would look like a Pro-Facebook campaign. Start a conflict, let people think that this is Facebook’s dirty little secret on how it all started and the rest will take care of itself.
About halfway through, you start realizing that this film is no longer about Facebook, in fact it could be a story about any product or service on the market today. Fincher doesn’t spend much time focusing on the actual Web site. He focuses on Mark’s two legal depositions that are happening simultaneously and the human and financial wreckage caused by his actions. This film is simply about greed and the want for more. Not necessarily more money, that wasn’t Zuckerberg’s intention when he started his site. He wanted to fit in with the rest of us. He couldn’t find an opening to the exclusive clubs on Harvard’s prestigious campus so he stared his own club.
Should you see this movie? Yes. But, not because you have a Facebook profile that you like to update every hour. This film is not about Facebook. This is a captivating lesson in human relationships. It is a window to the deep, dark soul of capitalism. It’s about living with past regrets.
It’s hard to judge Mark after seeing this film. He was doing what he thought was right. It ultimately poses this question – what would you do if you were in his shoes?
