Style over Story

Rating: 10/10 (6 November 2010)

The brilliance of this film rests more in its masterful, cinematic story telling than in the story. It is exceptionally well crafted. The editing, screenplay, and direction will most likely be winners at the Oscars.
As for the story, one can sum it up quite easily. A Harvard computer-application genius is rejected by his girl friend so he channels his sex drive by denouncing the female race through blogging and hacking Harvard's internet system. This generates 22,000 hits in just a few hours and he becomes famous, but is promptly put on academic probation. From there he uses the school's website as framework for Facebook in which he questionably violates numerous ethics, and eventually law itself. The legal inquiry is meshed throughout stunningly. In the end we see the youngest billionaire in the world sitting alone with a lap-top, sending a Facebook "Friend Request" to the girl he had revengefully humiliated in his internet blog at the beginning of the film. One can associate this to becoming a victim of one's own creation.
The film runs for two hours, but seems like 1 1/2. As suggested above, this is more likely because of style than story - except for the possibility that we all use, and are also likely victims of Facebook.