The Social Network

When we look back, The Social Network will probably go down as the movie that will best represent what it means to live vacariously through the internet over the past 2 decades, leading up to the culmination of arguably the biggest invention of our generation.

Perhaps it was the recent dry spell of not catching too many movies, but i highly doubt my senses were that numb or deprived to overrate a movie when i see one. This is one of the best movies I've seen all year.

The Social Network unveiled like a 2 hour tele-movie, in part due to Aaron Sorkin’s style of writing that has proved to be familiar in shows like The West Wing and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip – dialogue intensive scenes filled with long witty repartee, with plenty of dramatic punch, leading to dramatic twist of events.

If you’re not used to fast-talking actors rambling on and on like a bullet train, and if you’ve not seen an Aaron Sorkin show in your life, TSN might be hard to swallow initially, but if you stick with it, the rewards are tremendous. Aaron’s script is gripping and crafted in perfect timing, going between flash backs and flash forwards. This non-linear narrative, together with the smart script, had me holding my breath for more throughout the movie. I would say long takes like they do in The West Wing will be impressive, but David Fincher’s way of re-doing a take over and over again to the point of perfection might be very exhaustive for the actors. I’ve also read that Fincher is contractually bound to keep this movie under 2 hours. (haha)

There is so much rave going on for the 3 lead actors – Justin Timberlake, Andrew Garfield, and Jesse Eisenberg – that I went in with much expectations, knowing that both JT and AG have been touted to be competent for next year’s supporting actor Oscar race. In the end it was really Jesse who shone the brightest IMO, and whose performance I was most impressed with.

Justin Timberlake plays Napster founder Sean Parker, the douchebag that will expand Facebook beyond Zuckerberg’s imagination - a smooth-talking slime-ball, one of those businessmen so great with PR he will tell you the world is ending tomorrow and you will believe him. As smooth as he is on stage, Justin Timberlake seemed like a natural on screen. It wasn’t a breakthrough role for him, and there wasn’t much to test his versatility, so even though I thought it was believable, it wasn’t impressive.

Andrew Garfield’s role is incredible likeable. As Eduardo Saverin, Andrew Garfield played the role with immense earnestness. Eduardo formed the emotional aspect of the back story, and it is through him that issues of trust, friendship, loyalty and honesty were unveiled. In contrast, the twins’ narrative explored the violation of intellectual property and the blurring boundaries of what constitutes theft, and provided an insight into the Harvard’s code of conduct. Their meeting with Harvard president Larry Summers was an interesting scene, not entirely necessary and did not add to the pace, but it highlighted the Harvard community and its exclusivity, as well as the seemingly notoriety of the recently scandal-laden Harvard. One of the earlier scenes when Mark first created Facemash was brilliantly edited with the initiation into a Harvard sorority, building a correlation and an undercurrent early in the film, which will later prove to be one of Mark’s motivations for creating Facebook.

Rashina Jones looks like a Jessica Alba. Always lovely to see her on screen.

I thought the best performance, and undeniably the trickiest, came from Jesse Eisenberg. Jesse’s Mark is one constantly in thoughts; even when he is not speaking he seemed like someone who is going through a lot in his mind. There is a certain punk attitude, a contempt for rules, and an impenetrable quality about Jesse’s portrayal, all of which unbeknownst and belied when you look at a picture of the real Mark Zuckerberg. The kind of attitude that pays no attention to the superficiality and the farce around him, but instead has total devotion for what he believes to be the next best thing on campus, and his ticket to the girls he desires. So much of what he was going through was conveyed in Jesse’s restraint acting, and his facial expressions say it all. To say Michael Cera or Shia Labouf can replace Jesse is undermining what he has done, and I do not think neither of them can convey the depth and complexity of the character the way Jesse anchored it in vulnerability, and a delicate balance between conniving and determined. Well, maybe Shia can do it, but he doesn’t look like Mark Zuckerberg the way Jesse’s wide-eyed demeanor does. And Michael Cera is too kiddish for the role.

David Fincher has a great eye for detail and irony. I especially loved the subtle difference in the scene where Eduardo’s girlfriend almost set fire to his bed, and Mark was on the other end of the phone line, talking in front of a pool. The casting of Justin Timberlake as the person who “brought the music industry down” was ironic, given he is part of the music industry in reality. The one part I didn’t like was when the twins were competing in rowing and lost, played to blurry dreamy cinematography and chariots-of-fire-esque music in the background. I thought that portion was redundant and lingered for too long, and though I get a sense that Fincher might be mocking the standard jock-type, still it was a little overkill. Trent Reznor’s score together with another person whose name I can’t remember turns out to be pretty interesting, a few simple piano notes over a constant undercurrent of imminent buzzing, a perfect blend of pathos and anticipation.

The significance of movies based on reality has seldom lasted long. Think of all the movies that were deemed important in our generation: with the exception of Titanic, the technological and cultural significance of Star Wars, Jurassic Park, The Lord of the Rings, and many more, far outweigh the impact and social importance that reality-based movies have. Movies that directly depict or retell an important milestone in history – rather than one that represents it through fictional characters or genres – seemed to have lesser success. I doubt a decade later, we will look back at “United 93” or “World Trade Center” for insight into 9/11’s tragic happenings, neither will we revisit “Frost / Nixon” for that important interview, nor biopic “Che” for a sense of what it feels like to know Che Guevera.

Then comes TSN, a movie that in my opinion might not be timeless (because we can never know what the rapid rate of advancement in technology has in store for us), but it definitely represented a whole generation who grew up under the influence of the internet, where the boundaries of privacy are blurred and the voyeuristic nature of humans never more exposed.

I wished the film had more ambition though. Granted the film-makers have mentioned that this is not a film about the internet, but had the experience of the internet and its impact on modern life been explored more, this will definitely be a movie that will speak to the 550 million people on Facebook, and perhaps go on to become the movie of our generation.

Instead of having our Avatar and its constant droning of environmental preservation, its didactic and almost preachy manner of narration, the profuse display of the advancement in 3D technology, as well as the awe-inducing grandeur, TSN will go down in my books as one of the most important films of the last decade over Avatar, simply because the social-networking experience and the themes it highlights represents what each of us is going through, whether you’re 6 or 60.

Perhaps the final scene says it all – Jesse Eisenberg adding the ex-girlfriend as a friend on Facebook, the person that in the first scene somehow triggered the chain of events that led him to become the world’s youngest self-made billionaire. And he kept refreshing the page, over and over again, until the scene fades. Our infatuation with the site, at one point or another, is no different. We take action and we ponder, we wait and we can’t keep our eyes off it, eagerly waiting for something to happen. It is a meditation on what it means to be on Facebook – an addiction. In the end, Jesse became one of those 500 million members who can’t get enough of it, and can’t get what he wants out of it.