Ambitious concept is creative and compelling, but "Steve Jobs" misses on emotion

Rating: 7/10 (1 February 2017)

One of most successful and enigmatic tech minds and CEOs of the 20th century, the prospect of a film that could tear down the façade and present a compelling examination of Steve Jobs is pretty thrilling. Assigning that story to the only household name in screen writing, Aaron Sorkin, with Oscar winner Danny Boyle directing and one of today's most revered actors (Michael Fassbender) in the title role, the prospects turned out to be even juicier.
Yet "Steve Jobs," despite its dynamite acting and dramatic intensity, gets noticeably hampered by its own ambition. Sorkin endeavors to paint a complete and complex portrait of Jobs in a tidy three-act structure, with each act taking place in the hours and minutes leading up to three huge product launches: the Macintosh in 1984, the NeXT computer in 1988 and the iMac in 1998. On the precipice of believing he's about to change the world with each announcement, we come to know Jobs through a series of backstage interactions with colleagues past and present and also his daughter and her mother (Katherine Waterston).
This setup creates certain confines of time and space that serve as an echo chamber for the acting and Sorkin's dialogue, including his infamous "walk and talks" from his "West Wing" days. Although this amplifies the script, which is obviously positioned as the centerpiece of the film, it doesn't give Boyle any room to work with and begs the question of whether "Steve Jobs" would be better suited as a play.
Plays need great dialogue, great acting and great ideas and "Steve Jobs" has all of it. Even the supporting characters with whom Jobs interacts in each act conveniently remain the same: marketing chief and closest confidant Joanna Hoffman (Kate Winslet), old friend and Apple co-creator Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen), chairman of the board John Sculley (Jeff Daniels), Apple computer scientist Andy Hertzfeld (Michael Stuhlbarg) and Jobs' daughter, Lisa Brennan, played by three different actors. Each has different points of tension with Jobs and seem to have a a habit of confronting him in these moments.
These numerous interactions provide insight into Jobs' disastrous interpersonal skills, especially the moments with his daughter in which he seems incapable of wearing the mantle of parent. Fassbender is particularly good at portraying Jobs' apparent lack of empathy especially toward Lisa, whom he views as a market test for how the next generation will use or want to use personal technology.
On the other hand, Sorkin aims to depict Jobs as a visionary with a firm grasp on how people think, and how he let nothing stand in the way of forward momentum. One of the best examples comes early on when Jobs is insistent that the Mac says "hello" during the launch demonstration. His complicated friendship with Woz also brings this to the forefront; Woz insists that Steve give kudos to the team that developed the Apple II, which put them all on the map in 1977, yet Steve refuses him on principle. His never-look-back mentality was part of his genius and his flaws.
These verbal back-and-forths can venture into esoteric territory. We don't see or experience any of the development or creative process behind any of these three products, just talking heads dropping expository clues as they argue. This kind of limits the scope with which we can observe Jobs. We can only really watch how he treats people, because he's almost exclusively talking. We don't get to see him in action, which would more effectively stretch the palette of colors available to Fassbender and Boyle to paint Jobs' persona. This particularly harms the emotional appeal of the character and therefore the film. It's intellectually satisfying, but lacking in pathos. Such is Sorkin's bane at times.
"Steve Jobs" has the magnetism that a biopic of Steve Jobs should possess. That largely comes from skilled actors wielding Sorkin's sharp dialogue, which despite having its own drawbacks is fitting of a film about an entrepreneur who always found a way to rise, like cream, to the top. The film, on the other hand, doesn't quite rise to the top of creative biopics, though certainly not for lack of trying.
~Steven C
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