Mostly Excellent

Rating: 9/10 (18 October 2010)

At first, I was hesitant to see this film because it was based on the book "The Accidental Billionaires," which is basically character assassination of Mark Zuckerberg and Sean Parker in the form of a book. I was pleasantly surprised to find that while "The Social Network" doesn't pull its punches in the portrayals of everyone involved in the creation of Facebook, nothing comes across as overtly malicious.
The movie's opening scene shows Zuckerberg and his then-girlfriend Erica Albright sitting in a bar, discussing Harvard social clubs. Albright struggles to keep up with Zuckerberg's erratic train of thought, becoming more and more irritated with him, until he offends her so badly that she dumps him. Depressed and angry, Zuckerberg returns to his dorm room, gets drunk, and creates a website that allows users to compare girls from Harvard and choose which one is more attractive. And that's how the whole journey begins.
Along the way, the audience is introduced to Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (the Winklevi, as Zuckerberg refers to them in one scene), who serve as one of the major conflicts in the film (they sue Zuckerberg for stealing their idea for a social networking site), Eduardo Saverin, Zuckerberg's one-time friend and former CFO of Facebook, and Sean Parker, the paranoid, almost delusional founder of Napster and Facebook partner.
Viewers do feel rather sorry for Saverin, who, at first glance, seems like he got screwed over by Zuckerberg. But closer inspection reveals that he was not completely innocent either, being driven by a desire to make as much money as possible. Zuckerberg is portrayed as a driven, visionary young man who at the same time had a rather warped personality. And Sean Parker, who gets deeply involved in the Facebook venture, is shown as a hard-partying paranoiac, although he does seem to genuinely want to help Facebook become a success.
Altogether, "The Social Network" is a cautionary tale about how power corrupts, and money can cause good friendships to fall apart at the seams. Engaging and thoughtful, this film is worth seeing.