When Mark Zuckerberg, played by Jesse Eisenberg, starts to get the ball rolling in constructing his site, 'The Facebook,' his dorm is laid out with boards and papers and, of course, computers constructed an ever-growing matrix of society. Zuckerberg uses popular intrisnic motivations of current society as foundations that he would then interpret into programming code and expand upon. In one scene, Mark explains to his best, and only, friend Eduardo, why he inserted the 'Relationship Status', saying, "This is what drives life at college, 'Are you having sex or aren't you?' It's why people take certain classes and sit where they sit and do what they do. And at its center, you know, that's what The Facebook is gonna be all about." We never actually much of Facebook in the film, but, since we know what it is, anyways, we see reflections of it or residue. The brilliance of David Fincher's masterpiece, The Social Network, is this cultural and ideological interplay between the creation of Mark's and the reality in which he lives in.
I need to make a disclosure before I continue to discuss the film. There is much scrutiny delivered about the film that it is inaccurate about the origins of Facebook and about Mark, himself. The existence of the girlfriend, Erica, is totally false and all that. Well, I say to you, this film isn't about being as close to the truth as possible. If you want that, you should probably find a documentary or the book The Accidental Billionaires. The point is being missed when you are trying to find trivial information about the rise of Facebook. Again, the actual site hardly appears in the film. The effectiveness the film held in swaying you in that direction or the opposite direction is essentially up to you, but look at the way dialogue is given as well as the editing and I think it is safe to say triviality is something this film doesn't hold securely. Moreover, a film staying true to a story like this would involve a more predictable and definable conclusion.
Consider an early scene where Mark begins to create Facesmash. There is crosscutting between a provocative college party and Mark's analytic hacking across Harvard's social network. It is crucial to present this dichotomy since what seems to be going on is this deconstruction and reconfiguration of the sensationalism of the party. The spontaneity of the party culture is reinterpreted as instantaneous with Mark's Facesmash and eventual Facebook. Mark describes, in his swift, monotonous voice, how he hacks into the individual constructs of the social network, sometimes overlapping with the slow-motion shots of the party, where girls take off their clothing on top of tables, drugs are being taken, and alcohol consumed at ludicrous rates. This is essentially this reconfiguration of the reality Mark sees. It passes him by without much activity from him, but it is being dictated by him, nonetheless. This sort of set up is echoed when Mark and Sean, played well by Justin Timberlake, talk in nightclub, where they also discuss the impact of their technological ventures. Moreover, that scene can be said to echo the first scene where Mark and Erica break up (consider the use of the environment sound and how it seems overpowering).
Unfortunately, I won't go into that, but let's get back to the scene first regarded. When Eduardo comes in, Mark asks him for an algorithm to finish the program for Facesmash. This site, a reactionary entity constructed by the fumes of Mark's anger is also an algorithmic illustration of a specified social interaction, one that is a reduction of the integral value that it is interpreted from. In this case, how men perceive beauty in a girl. What drives Mark though is the sensationalism it would cause as well as the network it can grow. The idea of the HarvardConnection brought forth by Winklevoss brothers was the spark that opened Mark to a whole new way to see, well, civilization, a network that can grow indefinitely. This first scene shows the methodology to his madness, or logic, or illustration of reality that leads to Facebook and the philosophy that holds this together. This philosophy is cynically portrayed through Mark, himself, as well as a projection of the reality around him.
It is worth noting the biting, machine-gun-shooting, coldly amusing screenplay. The ferociousness and velocity of the deliveries is intense and gripping. If you went into this film taken by surprise by such characteristics, I suggest looking at Hollywood films of the 30s, 40s, and 50s. Films like Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard, and the scathing Sweet Smell of Success, since this film takes much from this style. But in this film it speaks to the instantaneous of Mark's mind, of the internet and the speed at which individuals live their lives in this day in age. Eisenberg is superb at his analytic and disconnected or fragmented portrayal of a man built not necessarily of human interaction but more for human constructs.
This film, not to feel repetitive, is about the emerging generation but also about our culture, both national and international, since this network can expand anywhere ("Bosnia has no roads, but it has Facebook."). Sean Parker tells Mark that we are digitizing our lives, it becomes a reorganization of our identity into windows and buttons as well as a reduction of our feelings and experiences into status and shortened phrases. Fincher used Mark as a vehicle to touch upon this observation. Mark's weakness in the film is the inability to see outside his network, outside the fragmentation of reality. So much he didn't even see his severance with his best friend. In addition, our lives revolve around the sensationalism of the moment ("You can now live the party on Facebook...") as well as the instantaneous nature of the internet, itself. The last scene embodies this theme. It all comes back to Erica, where Mark finds her Facebook page, friend requests her, and then continuously refreshes the page to see if she accepts. As much detachment Mark enabled throughout the film, especially towards Eduardo, he see him slightly fall from his fame and notoriety into a more sympathetic realm. Yet, he is tailored to his creation, as we all are in this generation; his life and his actions are determined by the speed of the internet connection.The friend request replaces the intimate contact of face to face interaction. There is so much to be said about many other scenes and their thematic content. This film is one of the most important films of this generation and it is and will be a document of our global culture for the future. It is a testament to a new way of looking at ourselves, humanity, and reality as a whole, the dis-assembly of the physical and reassembly of the way we connect with others.
I grew up with Facebook. I remember, early on, how tentative I was to send friend requests or accept requests because of the actual relation (ha, what does 'actual' signify in this day in age, anyway?) I had with that person. If that person wasn't a real friend why would they be one on Facebook? Now I have two hundred and something friends and most I don't talk with; I have already purged my friend list many times. I see status updates on things that are trivial and bare hardly any significance to me, whatsoever. I've seen posts of pictures that include starving children, oversexed scenes, homophobic remarks, religious tension, life as a party, and hallow rants. I see pictures of people's lives and events; the term 'Facebook stalking' has risen (though, in my opinion, if it is on Facebook it isn't stalking, at all, but that's a different story). Those pictured can be staged or more objective, taken in many parts of the world, with many different emotions involved. I see relationship statuses, the motivation for some great dialogue in the film, and I will admit that it has and does grasp my attention to whom it may concern (that's another story, too...). Facebook has changed the way I have looked on reality, perhaps irreversibly. When I watched The Social Network, the way in which it observed its characters without much sentiment and the way the film is constructed and edited, I saw remnants of my way of thinking. I saw some of myself in there. I think, in regards to my generation, we can see some of ourselves in it as well. I don't know if the film inspired thought and reflection on how we perceive others around us. I know it did for me.
For a superb analysis of shot and composition analysis, go here http://blogs.suntimes.com/scanners/2011/02/networking_the_frames.html
Also, and I'll blog about it the next time I see it, the film Moneyball carries similar themes and is one of the best films of this past year, easily.
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