For the most part, the Internet is not exciting. The Internet can be fun, but mostly only if you're playing a game. The Internet can be illuminating, educating, stimulating in various ways, but I rarely consider it exciting. Creating a Web site is tough work, as is maintaining such a site. Creating a social networking site is even tougher and more tech-heavy; even if that site turns out to be Facebook, how much intrigue can there be in its beginnings? The book on which The Social Network, one of the best films of the year, is based is called The Accidental Billionaires. Written by Ben Mezrich, the book details one side of Facebook's creation when there are, of course, many sides to the story. The site's founder and most famous name, Mark Zuckerberg, refused to participate in the book, and who can blame him? Though it's not a very well-done hit piece, the book is still pretty much a hit piece. Who wants to help themselves get taken down?
Billionaires focuses instead on Eduardo Saverin, the young man who was there from the beginning with money to help Zuckerberg make Facebook a reality, but ended up being pushed out as the site expanded to unthinkable heights. Saverin makes an interesting case, but even in the book, which I found alternately compelling and wildly boring, I kept thinking that he didn't have much to complain about. To quote a line from the already-classic screenplay from Aaron Sorkin, "If you were the inventors of Facebook, you'd have invented Facebook." Of course, hindsight is 20/20, but Saverin--pushed out for being too reticent, essentially--comes off as weak-willed even though he was acting this way...ABOUT FACEBOOK. What kind of loony doesn't jump on that opportunity?
The movie kind of has this problem as well, but director David Fincher and Sorkin embrace this, as opposed to just let it slide. No one is a hero in The Social Network; Saverin, Sean Parker, Zuckerberg; all are human, flawed, and all are capable of minor triumphs that give us reason to cheer. Of course, that's mostly thanks to the beauty of the dialogue in the film, which manages to remind us of Sorkin's past work in films and TV while sounding fresh and new. Jesse Eisenberg, in particular, is a gift to dialogue-driven writers. Even more so than in his previous roles, Eisenberg is breathless, hyperactive, nerdy, and perfect as the fictionalized Mark Zuckerberg. While the script jumps fluidly around in time, from before Facebook was even a gleam in his eye to dual depositions after the site went big, Eisenberg is a constant, effortless in his geekily arrogant outlook: he's the smartest man in any room, and doesn't even want to assume he has to deal with anyone who works slower than he does.
Eisenberg's is the performance that stands out even now, though Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield, as Parker and Saverin, respectively, are both excellent in divergent roles. Parker is presented here as nothing short of a personification of temptation. Wouldn't it be nice to live in California? All the girls. All the booze. All the connections. Just come with Sean Parker, and look the other way as he gets even more lost in a drug-fueled fantasy built of paranoia. Saverin is the soul of the film, even if that soul gets lost because it shouldn't keep trying to jump off the Facebook train. Garfield gets righteous, he gets indignant, he gets angry, and he still manages to be somewhat unlikable, partly just because he's a dumb college kid who doesn't know how quickly he's grown up.
The Social Network is likely going to get a lot of Oscar nominations, and I'll be honest, if it takes Best Picture, I'll be happy. The film may or may not be a generational milestone, as some critics have claimed. What the movie is is exciting. It's entertaining. It's intense--thanks partly to the score by Trent Reznor, which is awesome in its immense foreboding tones--and it's hilarious. The Social Network manages to be a movie about everything that shouldn't work on film, and is not only an important film but a fun one. Even with the Great Gatsby-esque touches thrown in by Sorkin and Fincher at the end, The Social Network is a truly great piece of cinematic style and entertainment.
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