Product: Startup.Com (2001)
Rating: 3.0
Primarily a historical doument rather than a documentry
This documentary is primarily a cinema verite documentation of the personalities behind a �start-up-dot-com� during the apex of the �internet bubble�. In other words, the directors used non-actors, such as the CEO and his co-founders, small hand-held cameras, and actual homes and surroundings as their location for this film to capture the personalities involved. This includes: The tantrums, the broken friendships, the narcissism, the venture capital meetings, and the often obscene; (yes, obscene), amounts of money tossed out by venture capitalists to anybody with a website as if they were drunk sailors visiting a two-dollar brothel.My favorite part was seeing our CEO interviewed on a �CNBC-like� program stating with a straight face that his company was worth 50 million dollars. Below him at the bottom of the screen was a stock-ticker going off with a myriad of internet ticker symbols rolling by which were all generally trading in the triple digit range such as, SUNW, or Sun Microsystems, trading then at $133.00 a share but now trading in 2002 at $4 a share.I often got angry watching this documentary primarily because of all the excess. However I am glad this film was made because it chronicles the personalities behind the history rather than the history itself. This is something we don�t see when we watch a documentary about the �1929 stock market crash�, or by reading a dry dissertation of the Dutch �tulip-bubble�.If you are looking for just the human story alone and what money can do to friendships and egos, buy this movie. If you are looking to observe the day-to-day management of a dot.com you will be disappointed.