Movie Thursday: #2

The Social Network

When it comes to movies, I have to admit, I tend to go with the critics. Of course, our tastes will sometimes differ as in the case of the Saw franchise (more on that next week) but for the most part I am right there with them. Last year, I hated Transformers 2 (after loving the first one) and voted Avatar as my movie of the year. Same with this year as Inception is probably going to end up getting that title for 2010. But after months of buzz I saw the Social Network and have to admit - it was really good.

I will try to keep away from spoilers (and any details about the movie will be vague), but there weren't any "twists" as this is a movie based on actual events. I say "based" because we all know that there are going to be some stretches. For example, after seeing the film you could think to yourself "it was really all about a girl?" And this is where I think the producers added a bit of their own touch to the movie. And ultimately it seems silly - a movie about Facebook. But it works.

Why exactly does it work? Three reasons.

1) The sound and imagery. I've never been a fan of Trent Reznor but the score to this movie was on point. It helped me to feel certain moments. And though I've never been to Harvard, I imagine those that have did a lot of finger pointing and many "I've been there" phrases were said.

2) The director. I've reached a point in my movie-watching status that not only will I be interested in a film because of who is in it, but because of who is directing. There are only a few that get this treatment (Christopher Nolan, Tony Scott, Clint Eastwood) but after being amazed by Fight Club, David Fincher is on that list. I think why this movie was able to win people over is the way he was able to weave three timelines (current legal battles plus Zuckerberg's best friend's perspective plus the Winklevoss twins). I never got lost and stayed interested.

3) The actors. After Adventureland, I'm not really a fan of Jesse Eisenberg. I was ok with him in Zombieland but I HATED him in Adventureland. I feel like if you take all the reasons people hate Micheal Cera - that is why I don't like Eisenberg. But he nailed it here. Especially because while Zuckerberg isn't a villian, he is kind of a dick (some of the material is straight from his livejournal

account). I admit though, I came in scouting Andrew Garfield, who plays Zuckerberg's friend Eduardo Saverin. I had seen him in "The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus" and knew he was going to play the next Spider-Man and based on this movie, I feel the web-slinging franchise is in good hands. And lastly, if Justin Timberlake didn't have respect as an actor before, I think he deserves it now. For some reason, I didn't know that he was playing Napster creator Sean Parker (I had no idea Parker was involved in facebook) but he played him perfectly. And ironically, I might add, as N'SYNC was popular around the time Napster was killing careers.

The best thing about this movie is I left the theater thinking about it. Facebook will be something that defines a generation. Just like Napster started iTunes and MySpace music. I remember thinking how we were going to have flying cars in the 2000s and people disappointed that we don't. But when you look at iPhones, twitter, YouTube... it is kind of amazing what technology can do.

Amazing, just like this movie.