The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)

In hindsight, having taken a week off on holiday is something of a godsend in that, for most of my trip away, I haven’t stopped thinking about The Social Network. Whilst I do have a few minor issues with it, for the most part, Facebook the movie is dynamite.

One thing that needs to be mentioned right off the bat is that this is as much Aaron Sorkin’s movie as much as it is Fincher’s. Why the two haven’t found each other before is somewhat baffling yet the rat-a-tat dialogue is terrific. In the opening alone we are treated to one of the best dialogue exchanges in recent years, yet this is one of many that litter the movie. Fincher’s trick to bringing the movie to two hours from a 160-page script? Just have everyone talk fast. Really, really fast. With a lesser screenplay at hand this technique may have fallen face first (can you imagine this kind of back and forth in, say, Benjamin Button?), yet for a movie about college kids living fast at the apex of their digital age, it’s perfect.

But as well as the dialogue, the film’s strengths are noticeable from the start. The cast are terrific. Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerburg is the obvious stand-out, playing the computer nerd equal parts mega-douche and “I just want to be loved”. Justin Timberlake also shows his acting credentials as mega-mega-douche, Sean Parker, arguably the man responsible for main conflict between Zuckerburg and best friend Eduardo Saverin (brilliantly played by future Spider-Man, Andrew Garfield), and amongst all the stars, Rooney Mara apparently impressed Fincher enough to warrant his casting her as Lisbeth Salander in his remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

I do, however, have a few gripes. The story of Facebook’s founding has become somewhat synonymous in recent pop-culture and, therefore, the story seems a tad void. We know where the key players now stand: Saverin won his case, the Winklevos twins ended up in the 2008 Olympics, Parker still owns part of the company, despite being fired from cocaine possession (the best moment in the film, in fact, is Parker’s call to Zuckerburg whilst awaiting bail) and Zuckerburg is now, officially, the world’s youngest billionaire. Whilst their fictional counterparts are never less than compelling, I found very few people to really latch onto. The story is so well documented in fact, that the film itself, despite being expertly conceived in everyway, comes off as almost a little too breezy to reach the heights of greatness it so richly deserves.

However unlike Fincher’s previous effort, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (a film that received lukewarm reviews yet I liked very much), The Social Network will almost definitely have endless replay value. Call it the Facebook generation’s All The President’s Men (which it already has), it is a film made to be a product of our times. The tale of greed vs. friendship/loyalty has been told many times, yet, since Wall Street, there has not been a movie so necessarily “of the moment”. As my friend Mr David Camp said, the fact that it’s about the biggest social networking sight in history is something of a by-product.

4/5