I saw The Social Network, aka the Facebook movie.
I love movies. I watch lots of movies, and I’m probably at a movie theater every other week. I love the way a story unfolds in a good movie and I love to make fun of a bad movie. I’m known among my friends for going out of my way to see bad movies just to make fun of them. The only thing worse than a bad movie is a mediocre movie because you can’t explain how horrible it was, and at the same time, you can’t rave about how good it is.
The Social Network is a terribly mediocre movie.
The plot was dull. Horribly dull. You know what’s going to happen because we all still use Facebook, and you can read all about Zuckerberg, Saverin, the Winklevosses and their settlements online. The way the story is told and because of history, you know Zuckerberg screws everyone over. The rest of the movie is a bunch of college kids on Facebook. Did you need to see a bunch of college kids get on Facebook? Have you ever watched someone use a computer? Trust me, it’s just as exciting to see on film as you’re imagining it is.
The characters are two dimensional at best. Zuckerberg just wants to screw everyone over and work on his ideas. Saverin is moneyed but incompetent. The Winklevosses are rich, spoiled, giants. Sorkin’s dialogue is great, but there isn’t much in the movie to show these are real people with hopes, dreams, and desires besides making money off a website.
Compare The Social Network to Zodiac, Fincher’s other film based on a true story. Zodiac is the opposite of The Social Network because the characters come alive. In Zodiac, you have a story that was never solved, and you get the feeling of exploration, mystery, and fear that grips California in the 1960’s. With The Social Network, you know where things are right now. You know Facebook is still here, and that Mark Zuckerberg is rich as hell. There isn’t any type of adventure, and the drama of litigation between rich folks isn’t dramatic.
If you want a movie that will bring down Facebook, make people hate Mark Zuckerberg, and make people question what they do online, The Social Network isn’t that movie. It isn’t even interesting from a social media perspective, and it’s not a great movie. I’m just hoping it doesn’t get a lot of Academy Award nominations, because if it does, I don’t want to know what Inception was.
Anti-Social Media