The Social Network

Film poster

I was obviously in the minority at RBC Film Club on Monday night, there was me thinking that David Fincher's latest film was about the social network service and website Facebook and the obnoxious wee Harvard students that conspired for world domination of cyberspace but I was wrong! It was a court room drama? The lightweight plot of The Social Network (2010) pivots between the rapid expansion, during 2003 – 2004, of the addictive, at times dangerous, internet phenomenon and the subsequent court squabble between the person credited with programming it, Mark Zuckerberg, and his former friends and business partners, litigation reaching a monitory conclusion but very little else.

The film, based on a book by Ben Mezrich The Accidental Billionaires, is interesting without being dynamic and far from being a candidate for the film of the year as suggested by some of Monday night’s audience. Although it has a cleverly written script by Aaron Sorkin, its rapid fire dialogue could be hard to understand at times. For example the opening scene between the soon to be Americanised Lisbeth Salander, Rooney Mara, and Jesse Eisenberg (Roger Dodger 2002, The Squid and the Whale 2005, Adventureland 2009) who plays the second year undergraduate. Zuckerberg and his cohorts are some of the most unlikable characters committed to film, the man himself is a surprisingly unsympathetic social introvert driven by the need to date girls more easily. I would disagree with the opinion offered that the film offers a snap shot of today’s youth culture, it may offer a snap shot of the more privileged section but certainly not of youth in general.