A movie about origins of facebook

Rating: 8/10 (14 October 2010)

The Social Network is a well-made movie about the origins of facebook. The movie begins with Mark Zuckerberg (to-be creator of facebook) having dinner with his girlfriend and this opening scene perfectly introduces Mark's character and sets the tone of the movie. He is an intelligent kid who is not socially adept. You can tell this by the way he talks to his girlfriend and what he does after the dinner. He goes to his dorm and writes bad things about his girlfriend on the web and insults her publicly. He also breaks into the school's database server, steals people's pictures from the directory and sets them up on the web in doubles as part of a competition to pick who is the hotter girl.
The Social Network shows how someone, while creating a brilliant tool that minimizes the distance between people, is creating a distance between him and the people around him. That is ironic. It also makes you question if morals and smart business decisions should always be in agreement. Because the decisions he makes are actually earning him benefits as an entrepreneur but creating conflicts with the others. I found myself wanting to side with him because he is a clever guy but he also has a way of looking down on people in a condescending way or pretending as if they don't exist.
The movie also makes you think the delicate connection between an idea as inception and its execution. You may have an idea but if you don't have the ability to execute the idea and turn it into a reality, you will be dependent on someone else. The executing ability could be better than just having the idea. I think this is a movie that anyone can appreciate and will find its subject matter interesting. After all Facebook has revolutionized how people socialize today.