The Social Network

The Social Network jumps back and forth between the origins of the now ubiquitous Facebook and two lawsuits brought against the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg—one by Cameron (Armie Hammer) and Tyler Winklevoss (Josh Pence’s body with Armie Hammer’s head) the Harvard Row Crew champions who allegedly seeded Zuckerberg with the idea of a social network, and Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield), an Economics major who later became Facebook’s former Chief Financial Officer.  Adapted from The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Mezrich, the argument presented is that Zuckerberg stole the concept for an exclusive social site from “The Winklevi” (as he calls the twins) and their business associate, Divya Narendra (Max Minghella).  They recruit Zuckerberg after he succeeds at crashing Harvard’s servers with a website called Facemash, which compares female students and allows the user to rate them based purely on appearance.  He also succeeds at offending every woman on campus including his girlfriend, Erica Albright (Rooney Mara).

Stalling for almost 50 days when working on their project, HarvardConnection, Zuckerberg launches his own in 2004, under the domain name thefacebook.com.  Overnight the site attracts 650 users.  Winklevoss, which one I don’t recall, angrily exclaims, “If I were a drug dealer I couldn’t find 650 people to give free drugs to!”  One of the more intriguing questions arises: How does a young man so universally-reviled on campus zero in on a paradigm that requires understanding people’s motivations?  There are inconsistencies in the character of Zuckerberg.  While socially inept and so absorbed with coding he’s not mindful of personal dress, hygiene or sleep in some scenes, yet he’s shown as villainously manipulative in others.  Although a female lawyer offers an ironic, self-aware explanation, “Creation myths need a devil.”

Director David Fincher attempts to chronicle the stratospheric growth of Facebook, yet the movie plays more like Revenge of the Nerds crossed with Pirates of Silicon Valley, accompanied by a high production value with a mesmerizing score by Trent Reznor.  Perhaps the film’s greatest spectacle, in the carnival sideshow sense of the word, is the appearance of Justin Timberlake as Sean Parker—venture capitalist and co-founder of Napster.  Having found The Facebook once it had expanded to other schools including Stanford, the Palo Alto entrepreneur (nearly broke from scads of music industry lawsuits) sets up a meeting with Zuckerberg and Saverin, who describes the vodka-spiked experience as The Sean Parker Variety Hour.  Mr. Timberlake does a commendable, though slightly over-rated, job of portraying a magnetic, imaginative and simultaneously paranoid socialite.  It’s unfortunate, however, that Mr. Timberlake’s suave, signature character type (oft seen in comedy sketches or other appearances), will get most of the media attention while few comments have yet to surface of Mr. Eisenberg’s more nuanced performance.

The genius of writer Aaron Sorkin and director David Fincher is that they transformed Mark Zuckerberg into an interesting character.  It’s compelling to perceive Jesse Eisenberg’s performance as the real Mr. Zuckerberg.  However, his snide quips, rapid-fire delivery (which on the page probably reads like programming code) and subtle facial twitches comprise an oddly charismatic introvert.  This is not the real Mark Zuckerberg, who comes off in interviews not as a calculating, Machiavellian schemer but rather a tactless adolescent, completely oblivious to his grating demeanor.

The film is visually and aurally engaging, most particularly in a tense interlude at the Henley Royal Regatta on the Thames, Oxfordshire, England.  Compounding Harvard Row Crew’s loss to the Dutch is a tilt-shift wide shot coupled with Edvard Grieg’s ominous In The Hall of the Mountain King. Mr. Fincher’s style may upon initial viewing distract us from otherwise notable flaws.  Writer Aaron Sorkin seems to have given witty, machine-gun dialogue to almost every character in the film including the Harvard President.  But Mr. Fincher is so clever at employing verbal rhythm to keep the story moving that most viewers will simply nod their head to the beat.  The Social Network, however, offers little insight into the motivations of Zuckerberg beyond revenge and remains focused heavily on fetishizing sociopathy while (watch carefully) employing several stereotypes at once—narcissistic, sociopathic white rich kids, ineffectual, nerdy Jews, Asian programmers and one token, macho black guy at a restaurant who tritely pipes up on Albright’s behalf, “Is this guy bothering you?”  But the larger error in the film is its misogyny.

Zuckerberg’s classes are almost fifty percent female.  Yet he has absolutely no female friends, other than the girlfriend he alienates.  We see women as objects of his and his friends’ desires.  We see busloads of them driven to Final Club parties on campus, where they dance in their underwear and make out with each other.  And then there’s Christy (Brenda Song) and Alice (Malese Jow), whose purpose (“nothing”) is quite clearly stated in dialogue.  They’re Asian women, which in Hollywood requires that they have loose morals and at least one of them is paranoid and controlling.  But save for Erica Albright and the female lawyer at Zuckerberg’s deposition, no woman in the movie is given something more to do than be an object.

Now, arguably this could be a product of the atmosphere Zuckerberg inhabited in school.  Harvard is notorious for several, exclusive, all-male Final Clubs, the most prestigious of which is the Porcellian, founded in 1791.  In recent years, Final Clubs have come under fire for their exclusive and historically racist practices.  So it’s unsurprising that Zuckerberg (the character) surrounds himself with white males, as he is most preoccupied with gaining their approval.  However, the filmmakers shouldn’t be let off the hook for leaving us with only two positive portrayals of women, who happen to be the only two in which the film’s main character takes interest.  This, coupled with the aforementioned ethnic stereotypes, gives the sense that they had given considerably less thought to character dynamics than to the hip, glamorous life of corporate pirates in the new media.  Young adults in today’s Entitlement Generation (see “Generation Me”, Newsweek, April 17, 2009) may come away from the film thinking that it’s perfectly justifiable to be an asshole and a misogynist, as long as you get into Harvard and come out a billionaire.

The Social Network • Dolby® Digital surround sound in select theatres • Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1 • Running Time: 121 minutes • MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sexual content, drug and alcohol use and language. • Distributed by Columbia Pictures

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