In Which I Ramble On and On Before Finally Making a Coherent Statement About The Social Network

--Dylan Chapman

You will never encounter a person more film-obsessed than me. And if you do, though I tend to doubt it, please introduce me, because I need friends. Half of my Chrome's home page's eight saved most-visited websites are film blogs. I get NetFlix movies in the mail more often than I get phone calls from my mother. I dissect movies like med students do cadavers and like literary literati do Proust. If I were given a chance to meet either Thai indie-director Apichatpong "Joe" Weerasethakul or President Barack Obama, well our fine Commander in Chief would miss the opportunity to hear my thoughts on his policies in person. Poor guy. But hey, it's not like HE made a five-minute shot of a pipe inhaling steam in a room full of discarded-damaged prosthetic limbs the most enigmatically powerful and affecting cinematic moment of 2006. All he did was, what, win an election or something?

The Oscars are like a second birthday for me, with their faux-mosest-faux-gracious-faux-religious accptance speeches and the looks on the four losers' faces as they come to the grim realization that they will be forever looked upon in history as also-rans and the DRESSES. My god, the dresses. I live for that shit. I follow the Oscars year-round--scouting possible award-worthy performances and films, making predictions, engaging in heated online debates about shifting Hollywood politics and trends--with much of the zeal and maniacal obsessiveness as a broker carefully tracking the undulations of the stock market or a fantasy football enthusiast following the every moves of his possible future team roster.

Anyway, this post is supposed to be a review of The Social Network, and I will be getting to that eventually, I promise. The point that my previous paragraphs were meandering around is that I follow the film industry like a fiend. I search and prod and poke and sniff around the internet like a basset hound for new nuggets (kibble, if you want to keep the metaphor going) of information and opinions about movies--retrospectives on old classics, casting news, previews, reviews, Oscar predictions, year-end top-ten lists, trailers, scene-by-scene analyses. If you hear about a film, you can bet that I've been following it since it was only the vague outline of the beginning of an idea in the screenwriter's head.

This is not necessarily a good thing. This is not how normal, healthy people should watch movies. See, there are certain movies that once it comes out in theaters I've been building anticipation steadily for about two years. I know the cast from the big Hollywood star all the way down to policeman #4. I've read sneak previews of the screenplay online. I've watched the trailer six times. I've read every review I can get my grubby hands on. All the while the anticipation builds and bubbles and rises within me like alka seltzer'd club soda with every new clip, every new announcement, every news snippet. And I impatiently count down the days on the calendar until the move releases, and I imagine to myself now amazing the movie is going to be, and I imagine myself sitting in the dark of the movie theater, my life being forever changed by the images on the screen and the sounds emanating from the speakers. And then the day finally comes, and I buy my ticket, and I find my place in the theater, and all that that anticipation amounts to is a helluva lot of disappointment. There is no way for any movie to possibly live up to my Mt. Everest expectations. Yet I still do what I do, time after time, movie after movie. Maybe it's because I still cling to a vague hope that one day a movie will meet my expectation, and not just meet them, but surpass them. A movie that will change my life. A movie that will rend my soul and split me up and put the pieces of me back together again a more complete and enlightened version of my former self. I'm Monty Python's King Arthur and the one perfect movie is my Holy Grail.

I thought The Social Network was going to be my Holy Grail. It had all the makings and all the signs and the stars were perfectly aligned. Since conception this was a prestige project. It was director David Fincher and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, two masters of their respective crafts, working on an interesting and timely and relevant project with wildly talented if underused or underappreciated up-and-coming actors. It was Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross doing the score. It was to be the movie of a generation. And at this point already I'm pumped, I'm there, I'm ready, I'm excited. Then come the whispers. Whispers from on set, whispers from those who had read the script, whispers from early-secret-private-hush-hush screenings, whispers from the caterer, whispers from the cameraman's girlfriend. "Hey...this movie...this movie is something special." And the whispers got louder as more and more people saw the movie and the whispers turned into chatter--excited, ecstatic, blissful quick conversations between those in the know. "Did you hear? Did you hear? It's something special. It's got it. It. It's the movie. The one we've all been waiting for." And the reviews started pouring in, rave after rave, perfect 100 after perfect 100. "Masterpiece." "Perfection." "The new Citizen Kane." And the chatter which had been whispers had now become a deafening roar. And here I was sitting at my computer taking in all the praise like a sponge, letting it fill me with hopes and ideas and optimism and anticipation. Is this it? The one? Could it be? So the release date approaced and I got a gift from heaven: an opportunity to see a free advanced screening more than a week before its official release when all the muggles get to see it. The day finally came. I got to the theater and stood in line for an hour, then finally--finally!--I sat sown and the move started and what I saw in those next two hours was...

...an excellent, well-acted, profound, funny, and perfectly executed movie. And that was the problem. It was still the movie; it wasn't an experience. I left the theater the same person who had entered it. I had been seduced by the hype and I had let it consume me and convince me that this would be the movie. I really thought it would be the one. So, even though the movie was excellent, even though I loved basically everything about it, I left the theater disappointed and a little heartbroken.

I realized that in order for me to get an accurate sense and idea of the movie, I would have to see it again, for in a second movie I wouldn't be blinded by expectation. So yesterday I braved the crisp autumn weather (where did summer go?) for a second go at The Social Network. I'm glad I did.

As you probably know, but is my obligation as the reviewer to inform you, The Social Network is the story of the creation of Facebook and the subsequent two legal battles concerning the site's original conception and ownership. It opens in a crowded, chattering bar and we meet a young, collegiate couple. Their conversation is fast, zipping from topic to topic as the girlfriend and the audience struggle to keep up. Such is the beauty of Aaron Sorkin's dialogue that it seems to be operating at two simultaneous levels. They are talking about rowing crew and SAT scores and getting into final clubs, but they are also talking about class struggles and intellectual superiority and personal dependence and self-image and countless other overreaching themes, and they don't realize this, and neither does the audience, not quite, but the audience can sense it. Not only is Sorkin's dialogue as smart as a whip, but it's also as fast as one and the sting is just as strong. The young couple talks for about five minutes as the hostility slowly builds and builds until the girl has had enough. She informs the man that they are no longer dating and leaves in a huff. The man, bewildered, alone, and dejected walks back to his Harvard dorm in the cold as the opening credits roll along to Trent Reznor's popping, humming techno-brilliant score. This is Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, world's youngest billionaire, and this is his story.

Mark is not your usual protagonist for a simple reason: he's not entirely likable and many people will consider him an asshole. He's emotionally frigid, intellectually condescending, and has no patience for stupidity or ignorance. He's played by Jesse Eisenberg with a dead-eyed-steely gaze in the the actor's best performance to date. Jesse's construct of Zuckerberg is not an imitation of the real life figure as much as it is the actor's personification of Sorkin's words. People whose first introduction to Zuckerberg is this movie might be surprised to find in interviews that the real Mark Zuckerberg does not talk at all like the man in the movie. Still, though he is a bit distant and callous (the closest he comes to a smile is a post fellatial smirk), the Mark Zuckerberg of The Social Network is a sympathetic character. His ideas and struggles are real and pure and timeless, universal, and though he is a bit of a prick, he's not malicious or devious, nor is he greedy or power-hungry. As a character puts it towards the end of the movie, "Every creation myth needs a devil," and that's Zuckerberg, thrust into that position of of necessity, not out of truth.

The supporting cast also shines most notably singer-turned-actor Justin Timberlake and on-the-rise British heartthrob Andrew Garfield. JT plays Sean parker, co-founder of Napster, who seduces Zuckerberg into the glitzy promise of sunny Northern California tech start-up wonderland. His is the showiest role, and Timberlake tackles it ably with devilish zeal and finely tuned comic timing. If Parker is the devil whispering in Zuckerberg's right ear, then Andrew Garfield's Eduardo Saverin is the angel whispering in his left. Mark's only (and then his last) friend, Eduardo is the beating heart of The Social Network. He's honest, hardworking, generous, innocent. The audience roots for him from the beginning, and his downfall comprises the largest emotional punch of the movie. Rounding out the cast are Armie Hammer as the Winklevoss twins, who claim they are the creators of Facebook, Rashida Jones as a legal counsel, Rooney Mara as Zuckerberg's ex-girlfriend, and Douglas Urbanski as the dean of Harvard in the film's funniest scene.

However, and this is no discredit to the actors, the characters in this movie are not nearly as important or as impressive as the words coming out of their mouths. Aaron Sorkin's screenplay is a work of art, at times witty, profound, hilarious, shocking or all of the above, and his dialogue is delicious. He manages to turn a somewhat simple story of the creation of a website into Greek tragedy. For herein are the classic themes--deception, friendship, power, frailty, duplicity--whose courses run through centuries and whose roots run through our souls, yet told through the lens of modernity and youth. This is very much a story of now, of our time, yet is is also timeless in its inarguable humanity. In one hundred years people could watch this movie to get a glimpse of a bygone era and bygone people, but they would also doubtless see a reflection of themselves.

Every aspect of The Social Network is exemplary, and though it did not change my life, it made for a very entertaining and affecting two hours that for a very long time. So I implore you, please don't let its subject matter turn you off from such an engaging, powerful, fun ride of a movie. The Social Network is a must watch.

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