8 Best Top nominations:
Best Picture
Best Director
Best Actor
Best Adapted Screenplay
Best Cinematography
Best Film Editing
Best Original Score
Best Sound Mixing
“The Social Network” tells the story of the start of Facebook and its creators, centering on Mark Zukerbeg, played well as an unlikable guy by Jessie Eisenberg. He manner of speaking in short clipped sentences is a also a bit irritating. As the movie progressed, I liked the character less and less. Jessie is well cast as Zuckerberg, and obviously the Oscar academy thought that as well, because he is nominated for Best Actor. The film portrays Zuckerberg as a cheat, liar, hacker, smart mouth, intensely driven, vindictive person. Is that enough adjectives to describe the main character of this film? The portrayal seems pretty harsh; is it all deserved and how much is true? Only the real life players know for sure.
The film opens with Zuckerberg as a Harvard student being dumped by a girl; then going back to his dorm room and writing angrily about her on his blog, defacing her. He goes on to rate the female students at the university online with the help of some friends. A great line in the movie is later said by that same girl, “… your blog wasn’t written in pencil, it’s written in ink. You can’t erase it...” A great reminder to ALL of us to be careful what we put out there. Apparently he blogged everything he did. My life isn't that interesting!
Two twin brothers the Winklevosses, (who sued him in real life and won $65 million dollars), approach him with their idea for a social network they claimed they called The Facebook, after seeing his rating system. They said that Zuckerberg stole the idea from them.
Meanwhile, Jessie continues to secretly create what ultimately becomes Facebook. He turns it into a social network, instead of a rating system. Zuckerberg and his friends are constantly bombarded with accusations from the brothers. Later the brothers are joined in pointing fingers at him by his former friends and partner Eduardo.
The story is fascinating and told through flashbacks as the participants are being cross examined by lawyers for the lawsuit. In the film, Zuckerberg seems to have screwed over everyone he ever worked with. One of those people includes Sean Parker founder of Napster, played as a slick, savvy guy who shoots advice from the hip by Justin Timberlake. Timberlake is convincing and good in his role.
The film is incredibly well done, with fast paced, but well plotted out time lines and loads of information. There are beautiful shots of the crew rowing teams on the water, Harvard yard and many of the nearby buildings. The film editing keeps the movie flowing and keeps the information from becoming overwhelming to viewers. The film editing crew did their job very well. But I barely noticed the score, was there one?
I did notice that the sound mixing was really good and very realistic, especially at the clubs and parties. I really liked that the music at the club, where Zuckerberg has a meeting with Parker, is so loud you can just barely hear Parker talking to Zuckerberg about his ideas. I thought, now that‘s great. That how loud it should be. That’s how loud it is in a club. The beat’s pounding and Timberlake is talking to Eisenberg’s character and you feel that they are really in a crowed club, not a film set. Good job guys, I bet the average movie goer rarely credits you with that!
The best picture, director and other Oscar nominations are well deserved. I’m not totally surprised that there are no supporting nods for the other actors. They are good, but Oscar demands great. Now it’s just a matter of time, and the Oscar ceremony to see who actually wins the awards. There are still 5 other films I need to see. I think this is going to be a tight race between;
Black Swan
Inception
The King’s Speech
The Social Network
I think that "The Social Network" will win. I could be completely wrong too! But I doubt it. “Toy Story 3” should and will win in the Best Animated Feature Film category and really has no chance as Best Picture with such a strong group of movies.
Rating – 4.5 stars
