The Social Network

Rating: Null/10 (20 September 2011)

The Social Network is a movie that tells the story of Mark Zuckerberg, the youngest billionaire in the world. This movie has a great theme which shows the rise and social fall of the ironically claimed "Social King." Themes in this movie include: Friendship, Betrayal, Success, Jealousy, and Power. The main characters in this movie include Jesse Eisenberg who plays Mark Zuckerberg, Rooney Mara who plays Zuckerberg's heart strings as Erica Albright, Justin Timberlake who plays Sean Parker, the man made famous for being the creator of Napster, Andrew Garfield who plays Zuckerberg's closest friend throughout the movie as Eduardo Saverin, and lastly Armie Hammer and Josh Pierce who play Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss the angry twin brothers who accuse Zuckerberg of stealing their idea. The movie uses a flash back type of theme throughout the movie showing the history between the characters as well as the success of the social media site called Facebook. The main character, Mark Zuckerberg is shown immediately as a very smart, socially awkward, computer wizard. The beginning scene of the movie shows Zuckerberg and his friend of which he is romantically interested in, Erica Albright talking at a bar. Through this scene it is very obvious that Zuckerberg is not a very good communicator as Erica shows how she is annoyed at his back and forth talking of random things. Throughout the movie you get a sense that Zuckerberg, who knows he is intelligently blessed, is always skeptical of people that want to socialize with him. In most scenes of this movie whenever someone wants to talk to him he responds with "What would you like me to do for you" and he is always showing signs of skepticism. Throughout the movie he meets Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, a set of wealthy twins that are athletes with Harvard University. They are interested in using Zuckerberg's computer skills to create a social networking website for the men of Harvard University to meet women. Throughout the movie Zuckerberg along with his close friend Eduardo decide to make a complete social networking website for everyone to use. The twins get word of this and decide to sue Mark for stealing their ideas. Throughout the movie it seemed as if motivation for Mark was to do something to be socially accepted in life. One common theme throughout the movie was that Mark kept trying to reach out to Erica as if he was just trying to find a way to have a connection with her. While on his journey, Mark ends up connecting with the creator of Napster, Sean Parker. Sean is an outgoing "do things now, not later" type of guy that ends up helping face book take off through big investors, while Mark's friend Eduardo does not have the same type of luck in New York trying to get investors. With his charismatic charm, yet untrusting characteristics, Sean ends up working his way into the company and gains the trust of Mark while secretly putting Eduardo into a bad business decision which ultimately gets him out of the company. During the movie the director used many different styles of filming. One of the common features was using camera angles to show multiple characters and their responses at the same time. During the time when Eduardo found out that he was being let go from Facebook the director was able to show the body language of Mark, Eduardo, Sean, as well as the other background characters in this scene. This helped to show multiple things: The surprise on the face of Mark, the smirks of Sean, the betrayal felt by Eduardo, as well as the surprise and fear in the co-workers faces. Another style of filming I noticed was the use of lighting and shades during scenes. During times in the movie when "shady" things were going on such as characters doing drugs, bad business deals, and the introduction of untrusting characters, the scenes tend to go into a darker setting in which the viewer gets the feeling that something is not right. The faces of the actors also tend to be darker, where as in other scenes such as the competition for a new intern, the room was dark but all of the characters were well lit. In the end of the movie Mark ends up settling with the Twins and Eduardo and pays them a substantial amount of money. One of the most powerful scenes in this movie was at the very end in which Mark sent Erica a friend request. Sitting a dark room the movie ends with Zuckerberg hitting the refresh button multiple times to see if she accepts. This goes to show that the intention of Zuckerberg was just to try and be accepted in a way that will allow him to create a social connection. This movie as far as the way it is directed with a flash back type of style reminds me of the movie Inception in which they use this method to show the former life of the main character in the movie. In inception this method goes to show how the character has ended up in the position that they are currently in a lot like the movie "The Social Network" did. This movie overall was a good movie that showed the life to success and how power and success can ruin friendships.