Introduction and Overview
Every age comes with a visionary who changes the face of the times he lives in and Mark Zuckerberg was one of such people. While not an accurate biography or even accurate tale of events, The Social Network tells of the events that led to the invention of Facebook and the enemies and wars he had to fight along the way. We see this movie begin in Harvard and end in Palo Alto
Beyond the obvious comparison to Facebook, this is not a Facebook movie. What it is though is a movie about inspiration and the cost of success and betrayal. The movie is mostly told in flashback mode as we see it told through two depositions for different lawsuits. One of the lawsuits is from his former friend Eduardo while the other is from the Winklevoss twins and their business partner Divya. On paper this should be a movie that is likely to fall flat but the strength of the storytelling makes this one to watch as the audiences no longer look at the people as black or white, hero or villain but rather they have all been blanketed in grey as there is enough blame and credit to go round everybody. Credit must be given to Sorkin and his writing prowess as his writing is what brings this film to life. In my opinion you don’t have to know what Facebook is or even how to use the Like button in order to enjoy and take life lessons from The Social Network.
There is a recurring theme with The Social Network and other movies by David Fincher. He has a knack for portraying his people as somewhat out of sync as they share unhinged worldviews. We can see that in the Fight Club and Se7en and it is also evident in this movie. Aaron Sorkin who is arguably one of the best script writing somehow turned a film about intellectual property theft and legal arguments to something akin to a thriller based off its scripts alone. Working with this amazing script, Fincher was able to turn a movie in which people are just talking for long stretches of time into riveting cinema.
The Social Network was a film that did not go according to type. There was nothing to suggest it would do well as it was a movie about the creation of a website. If that was not enough of a recipe for disaster, it was penned by a screen writer known for his verbose screenplays and a director that is partial to bravado. The soundtrack was handled by Trent Reznor of the Nine Nine Nails fame and one of the key supporting characters was none other than Justin Timberlake. The combination of people involved in this film seemed destined to make the movie fail and everybody but the producer and those involved in the film believed the film was more than just retelling the Facebook story. The thing about The Social Network is that after you have seen the movie you will still expect the movie to crash and burn because the movie does not have the necessary ingredients expected in the big blockbuster movies.
Credit must be given to David Fincher and Aaron Sorkin on their achievements in making this movie one of the greatest legal thrillers. The film does not include anything that could be considered conventionally exciting as we don’t have people killing to avoid being killed or any other variation of violence available in our movies today. Instead, we are given talking and more talking. Many have claimed that the success of this movie lays in the person of Zuckerberg – a man of variations whom you are prone to love and hate. This is a man who wants to be successful but not really crazy about monetary gain. Jess Eisenberg portrayed the person of Zuckerberg perfectly well and while many things can be said about The Social Network, not much can be said about the person of the Mark. He brought the character to life in a showing that is truly Oscar worthy. Other than Eduardo, Mark is the only character that is multi-dimensional. Sorkin and Fincher created a movie that could be termed as being soulnesss as we see time and time again the actions of Mark literally is a slap to the face of others with his “I don’t give a damn attitude. .
Personal Hopes and Conflicts
At this point it must be noted that although still just a film, The Social Network is indeed loosely based off a segment of a man’s life and the relationships he made and destroyed on his way to the top of the Silicon Valley. As anybody who has seen this film can say, you inadvertently leave the cinema feeling sorry for what Mark lost on his way to making the world one big ‘Friend Zone’ – mostly relationships and friends, you are bound at some point to judge him even if just momentarily. While Hollywood did glamorize the story for the sake of the cinema, there are many segments of the film that if remotely true spoke volumes of the ethics or lack thereof of Zuckerberg and this is damning to a man who holds such a clout in the sector he had occupied.
For a while there were whispers that The Facebook team would sue the picture for defamation of character but eventually nothing became of that rumour as they instead decided to ignore the movie completely in the hopes that the audience would too as well and just maybe The Social Network story would die before it even lived. And while Mr Zuckerberg has repeatedly claimed that the movie is indeed the work of someone’s imagination, Mr Sorkin did not aim to make Zuckerberg out to be the villain of the movie but rather to show him as a flawed human being with a strong desire to be accepted and as a result was driven to create a website that just does that – accepting friends.
With all said and done, The Social Network was one of the best movies of 2010 boasting an impressive rating of 97% at ‘Rotten Tomatoes’. The movie is praised for its script and how that script is delivered. However the story was not so before its release as people viewed the project as just a means for economic gain and claimed it to be a B-film at best. Today analogies are used to describe the film with many comparing it to great art. While the effusive praise may have helped moved the movie a bit, The Social Network would have stood firmly on its feet even if there was no one shouting its praise from the rooftop.
We see a film where the main character is driven by rage, humiliation and ambition. The character is a very complex man whose professionalism is coloured by naiveté and frustration. He is willing to sacrifice his relationships in a hope for popularity and financial gain.
Fincher uses music and lightning to assist his rhetoric as he guides his viewer to perceive the expected.
Why The Social Network is Essential Viewing for Entrepreneurs
Just like with any movie that takes up a person living or dead to portray on the big screen, The Social Network has its fair share of ethical debates especially seeing as Mark was not forthcoming with offering assistance and insights into his life for the making of this movie. Notwithstanding this movie has some valuable nuggets of truth and should be watched any technologist, film student or even an entrepreneur. More and more people in our world today use the internet and this affects the speed with which internet driven companies grow. What Facebook and the movie were able to show us is that man is a communal animal and he would gravitate towards anything he believes to be worth joining. Mark understood the changes popularity would bring to his site and he did everything he could to maintain that pace to the point that he got explosive when Eduardo froze him out of the account to get back his attention. Mark retorted that Facebook was different because it never crashed. He understood that he needed that extra thing to stand above the rest of his competitors.
Ethics and Values – What I Learnt.
The Social Network as a movie is not really a biography of the founder of Facebook as many people have assumed. What it is actually is a film that talks about ethics, relationships that ends in lawsuits and intellectual property. It also shows that more often than not, it is always lonely at the top. However while it is obvious that this film is in some way talking about Mark Zuckerberg’s meteoric rise to wealth at the hand of his invention, it must be noted that cinematic liberties were taken and some of the regular storylines were exaggerated for the purpose of the audience. David Fincher developed this movie off the book, “The Accidental Billionaires” by Ben Mezrich. In this film there were some insights that could be gleaned and could generally be used in our own lives.
- Unlike patents that protect creative works and inventions, business ideas are not protected. That was one of the running themes in the movie where it needed a lawsuit to settle if it was indeed Mark or the Winklevoss twins who had the Facebook idea. As an individual I am not in favour of keeping people in the dark while I pursue my own business idea, but in the world we live in I understand how somebody would want to do what the character did in the movie in a bid to starve off his competition while he put his own business forward even though many people would see that as been unethical.
- It helps to always think long term and not just about instant gratification. While I saw how this was true in the movie it is also very true in our day to day lives. While Eduardo had good intentions in trying to get advertisers in a bid to monetise Facebook, Mark was more concerned in making Facebook a great product as he was sure that if he made that his focus every other thing would fall in place. Facebook has so reinvented social media that it is almost scary to think of what our lives would be like without it and this came about basically because Mark looked ahead.
- While I cannot say how exactly Mark and Eduardo’s friendship and business relationship panned out in real life, the movie showed us a friend who treated his only real friend badly. Although you cannot force a friendship to last beyond its time, business is a totally different story and Eduardo was cheated out of his shares because he did not have a signed agreement in place as he felt he was working with his friend. Businesses and business partners need to have legal representation whether they are friends or family. This film showed us the importance and detriment of those actions.
- While I am an advocate of people gaining their education I have come to see that education in itself is not a blueprint for success as we have seen from people like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg who left school halfway because they had an idea they could not let go of.
Conclusion
Some people go through life happy to live day by day without any thoughts of leaving a legacy. Others may have a dream of a legacy and life and the problems it brings will make it outright impossible for them to pursue such dreams. Then, finally there are those who have dreams and then do everything in their power to make sure those dreams come to pass. These are the people that history remembers and Mark Zuckerberg of The Facebook phenomena is one of such people. Mark is not the first person to have an internet business, in fact Sean Parker whom Mark worked with had created Napster previously. But there was something about The Facebook that made it higher than its peers.
We can’t deny that Mark overstepped common courtesy and ethics in the building of Facebook no matter how fictitious the Facebook people claim Aaron’s screen play to be. However the thought that he was coming up with the next big thing saw him through the nights that he shafted the Winklevoss brothers or the times he ignored Eduardo so he could be focussed on his invention. While many people have said that the character of Mark was unable to love anyone and be in any meaningful relationship, I will like to disagree because I felt that Mark really liked Eduardo and even towards the end when we see the realization hit him that he has lost his only real non virtual friend, we see the pain etched on his face and for a while we are almost tempted to bear the pain with him. Friendships are important to our lives and The Social Network showed just how important these relationships are. It could be seen as a proverb or parable to the man who stays up all night looking to his Facebook page to see if he has per chance made a new friend.
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