"The Social Network," which I have referred to as the Facebook movie, is the ultimate capitalist movie. It seems to be primarily about a bunch of white men fighting over who's going to profit from the creation of Facebook, a means of connecting people with each other, first at Harvard and then the world. This story seems to mirror the tale of Bill Gates and the founding of Microsoft. Although Facebook may have originally been intended by its creators as a way of getting laid, ultimately as everything in capitalism it becomes a fight over who's going to profit. From the film, it's quite hard to tell the difference between these guys, who seem to spend most of their time in court. And it's also hard to tell why we should care.
Aaron Sorkin, who created one of my all-time favorite TV series, West Wing, adapted the screenplay from Ben Mizrach's The Accidental Billionaires. It's a perfectly serviceable if unexciting script. The acting is pleasant, but I don't think anyone from The Social Network will take home one of the upcoming Oscars. Speaking of Oscar, it's interesting that The Social Network won many of the critics awards but seems to be fading fast in the Oscar race to its main competitor The King's Speech.
It might have been interesting to learn more about these characters outside of their connection to Facebook, but then from what we do see, it might not.
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