loren is this a question you always raise about movies based on true events or is it just the fact that this is a fairly recent event?
I actually wrote up a post at work but apparently it didn't actually post.
Mostly my issue is that it's still recent, or at least that's what draws my attention to it. It's a story that happened like seven years ago and is still pretty much going on in many ways. I'm sure I'm being at least somewhat hypocritical in regards to other films though. I'm less aware of the creative liberties taken with other biopics.
Saw the film on opening night. It was pretty interesting, and got to boast to my wife how much of a geek I was because I actually understood his "blogging" reports in the first 10 minutes of the film.
My wife enjoyed it too which was surprising, as she isn't a huge techno-geek like I am, so that says something.
We had a lengthy conversation on the way home as to whether or not the Zuckerberg portrayed in the film was a huge douchebag on purpose, or just didn't have time for/wasn't taught social niceties, hence, came across that way.
I kinda felt sorry for the character (I hesitate to liken the actual person to the person we see in the film) at the end, but then caught myself and remembered his actions throughout the film.
There's a surprising amount of attention to detail in that movie.
As a fellow dork I did end up discussing whether or not the iBook or Street Fighter 3 third strike cabinets were historically accurate.
One bit from that discussion that I find striking--where my concerns are concerned--is that FaceMash was not gender-exclusive. That's a pretty plainly dishonest attempt to cast Zuckerberg in a certain light. I read about this earlier but it didn't catch my eye.
Isnt the main theme of the film that Facebook has radically changed the social landscape of the average citizen?
That really seems off the mark. In the movie at least, Facebook was the manifestation of the idea that the college social experience is based on exclusivity, not the reason for it.
Even that doesn't really matter. The film was a character driven drama about an inscrutable asshole and a fortune that drove a bunch of bright young kids against each other. It didn't really seem to care about the importance of Facebook's effect on the social landscape beyond the irony of its creator being pathologically anti-social.
I think that's probably an irony that exists in the movie alone.
we get it
edit: Seriously, has this been three pages of you going on about the movie being fictional and everyone else telling you they get it? Because... we get it. It's fictional.
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
The point is that it is basically a wink and a nod from saying it's real. The main problem, for me, is that they wanted to tell the story of the multi-billionaire, but they couldn't get him to give a damn, really. So they just made some shit up. Is Zuckerberg ackward? Probably. does he feel jealous, and has he felt inadequate in the past? More than likely. Is he something of a bastard? He's made $25 Billion. He has to have a little bit. But either the point doesn't work, or it all needs to be true. You can't have a true story, make a whole bunch of shit up, and retain the poignancy that the story would have had otherwise. I guess for me, the whole story is kind of blunted, because instead of being left asking questions about the irony, I'm left with questions about what exact situations did the creators make up, and what did they leave out.
Edit: Also, the way gender is portrayed in media is a problem way beyond historical accuracy, and the suggestion that it's just because the author's a woman is kind of ridiculous and stupid.
Further, I don't think the division between truth and fiction is nearly as definite as you seem to claim (someone debated with their friend about the accuracy of the iBook and video game cabinets. That's a level of pedantry that's somewhat deep, isn't it?) There have been claims of deep factchecking here as well. Which is it? You can't have both.
However, I think that it's possible that my dislike seems to be the paranoia that a significant of the (at least critical) praise this movie is getting is because no critic wants to be seen "out of touch" with modern culture and facebook, that "they just don't get it". Especially when "it" is worth a gargantuan amount of money.
And again, I realize the book draws on more sources than the book itself, but I just want to remind you that someone who called themselves the next Hunter S. Thompson, wrote a book they claimed was nonfiction and then made up a whole bunch of shit, and then sold the movie writes for a probable large amount of money is at the center of this. Why not write a story about that douchebag?
The point is that it is basically a wink and a nod from saying it's real. The main problem, for me, is that they wanted to tell the story of the multi-billionaire, but they couldn't get him to give a damn, really. So they just made some shit up. Is Zuckerberg ackward? Probably. does he feel jealous, and has he felt inadequate in the past? More than likely. Is he something of a bastard? He's made $25 Billion. He has to have a little bit. But either the point doesn't work, or it all needs to be true. You can't have a true story, make a whole bunch of shit up, and retain the poignancy that the story would have had otherwise. I guess for me, the whole story is kind of blunted, because instead of being left asking questions about the irony, I'm left with questions about what exact situations did the creators make up, and what did they leave out.
Or maybe that's all irrelevant, because it's all fiction. And fiction is allowed to reference real world events and institutions and still be poignant and ironic and tragic. I honestly do not give half a shit about the real Zuckerburg. I assume he's not not a terrible person. He's just not relevant to my experience with the movie. Because it's all fiction.
Christ, it's not like most people who are loving this movie are loving it because they think it's a fascinating documentary about Silicon Valley or a representative creation myth for the social networking phenomenon or an accurate portrayal of an actual sociopathic billionaire. It's a character driven drama. And it's a really impressive one. And I wish people were talking about that, and not whether or not the movie is real. Which it isn't. Because it's all fiction.
The point is that it is basically a wink and a nod from saying it's real. The main problem, for me, is that they wanted to tell the story of the multi-billionaire, but they couldn't get him to give a damn, really. So they just made some shit up. Is Zuckerberg ackward? Probably. does he feel jealous, and has he felt inadequate in the past? More than likely. Is he something of a bastard? He's made $25 Billion. He has to have a little bit. But either the point doesn't work, or it all needs to be true. You can't have a true story, make a whole bunch of shit up, and retain the poignancy that the story would have had otherwise. I guess for me, the whole story is kind of blunted, because instead of being left asking questions about the irony, I'm left with questions about what exact situations did the creators make up, and what did they leave out.
Or maybe that's all irrelevant, because it's all fiction. And fiction is allowed to reference real world events and institutions and still be poignant and ironic and tragic. I honestly do not give half a shit about the real Zuckerburg. I assume he's not not a terrible person. He's just not relevant to my experience with the movie. Because it's all fiction.
Christ, it's not like most people who are loving this movie are loving it because they think it's a fascinating documentary about Silicon Valley or a representative creation myth for the social networking phenomenon or an accurate portrayal of an actual sociopathic billionaire. It's a character driven drama. And it's a really impressive one. And I wish people were talking about that, and not whether or not the movie is real. Which it isn't. Because it's all fiction.
Like every biopic EVER. No matter it is about some event last year or a thousand years ago. They all have some things that are made up.
Because they aren't documentaries. They don't intend to be documentaries or a factual account of someone's life. They are movies that have an intention of telling a story and, hopefully, be entertaining.
The point is that it is basically a wink and a nod from saying it's real. The main problem, for me, is that they wanted to tell the story of the multi-billionaire, but they couldn't get him to give a damn, really. So they just made some shit up. Is Zuckerberg ackward? Probably. does he feel jealous, and has he felt inadequate in the past? More than likely. Is he something of a bastard? He's made $25 Billion. He has to have a little bit. But either the point doesn't work, or it all needs to be true. You can't have a true story, make a whole bunch of shit up, and retain the poignancy that the story would have had otherwise. I guess for me, the whole story is kind of blunted, because instead of being left asking questions about the irony, I'm left with questions about what exact situations did the creators make up, and what did they leave out.
Or maybe that's all irrelevant, because it's all fiction. And fiction is allowed to reference real world events and institutions and still be poignant and ironic and tragic. I honestly do not give half a shit about the real Zuckerburg. I assume he's not not a terrible person. He's just not relevant to my experience with the movie. Because it's all fiction.
Christ, it's not like most people who are loving this movie are loving it because they think it's a fascinating documentary about Silicon Valley or a representative creation myth for the social networking phenomenon or an accurate portrayal of an actual sociopathic billionaire. It's a character driven drama. And it's a really impressive one. And I wish people were talking about that, and not whether or not the movie is real. Which it isn't. Because it's all fiction.
It's actually not all fiction, in fact the majority of it isn't. The blog by Zuckerberg was real, the lawsuits were real, the Winklevosses and Saverin's explanation of what happened was real (some of the dialogue were even direct quotes), everything that happened regarding Sean Parker was real, and I'm sure there's more. The movie is non-fiction with a fictional perspective on who Zuckerberg is, what goes on in his mind, etc. It's not hard to grasp this concept, biopics do it all the time.
This doesn't mean it's a documentary or the ultimate word on the subject, it just is what it is.
I think that's probably an irony that exists in the movie alone.
we get it
edit: Seriously, has this been three pages of you going on about the movie being fictional and everyone else telling you they get it? Because... we get it. It's fictional.
Of course it's fictional. It's also dishonest, and intentionally so.
You don't write out a guy's girlfriend, start a movie with a fake girlfriend calling him an asshole, and make facemash a girl-rating app without an agenda.
I'm sure this was written as entertainment, but it has the subtext of a hit piece. Perhaps this is simply my unawareness of the details of Malcolm X, but I have a feeling that I'd be pissed if Spike Lee put that kind of slanted, plainly fictional motivation on the protagonist of that movie.
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VariableMouth CongressStroke Me Lady FameRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
'really smart guy invents new thing because he's smart' isn't that interesting of a story
I think that's probably an irony that exists in the movie alone.
we get it
edit: Seriously, has this been three pages of you going on about the movie being fictional and everyone else telling you they get it? Because... we get it. It's fictional.
Of course it's fictional. It's also dishonest, and intentionally so.
You don't write out a guy's girlfriend, start a movie with a fake girlfriend calling him an asshole, and make facemash a girl-rating app without an agenda.
I'm sure this was written as entertainment, but it has the subtext of a hit piece. Perhaps this is simply my unawareness of the details of Malcolm X, but I have a feeling that I'd be pissed if Spike Lee put that kind of slanted, plainly fictional motivation on the protagonist of that movie.
I'm not seeing the grounds for calling it a hit job. Movie-Zuckerburg comes off worse than real-Zuckerburg, but who cares about the real Zuckerburg? Certainly nothing in the movie suggests its creators care one bit about the actual man or about the real Facebook. They don't even really seem to care about the implications of social networking in the first place. Maybe if the movie had themes of degrading privacy and the greed of the super wealthy or something, then yeah, maybe there'd be a basis for thinking the movie's liberties were intended to smear Facebook by misrepresenting its CEO.
Except the movie doesn't really care about any of those things. It's a character driven film that uses a cool idea (an undergraduate employs his entrepreneurship and genius towards becoming the world's youngest billionaire) as the vessel for human drama. So yeah, in that case, you do make the young billionaire genius an asshole. Or rather, you make him whatever you want to make him. Whatever works best to create the most engaging human drama.
I'm a little confused. Is this that "Facebook: The Movie" thing we kept hearing about late last year?
yes.
And it is a very good movie about the creation and rise of facebook, with minor liberties taken so that they can inject a drama into the story.
Never you mind what Loren is saying; it is not the 100% truth, but no biopic (or even documentary for that matter) ever really is. What it is is an entertaining story largely based on facts from court records and firsthand accounts.
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I was rather impressed by the movie. Good dialogue, good acting, good drama. And even though the Zuckerberg portrayed is an asshole, you can sympathize and even relate to his plight. Based on the actions of the character, he should be inherently repulsive, but because of the way the film is written, the audience can understand him and see him as a tragic, flawed human being rather than a 2D cutout.
I think that's probably an irony that exists in the movie alone.
we get it
edit: Seriously, has this been three pages of you going on about the movie being fictional and everyone else telling you they get it? Because... we get it. It's fictional.
Of course it's fictional. It's also dishonest, and intentionally so.
You don't write out a guy's girlfriend, start a movie with a fake girlfriend calling him an asshole, and make facemash a girl-rating app without an agenda.
I'm sure this was written as entertainment, but it has the subtext of a hit piece. Perhaps this is simply my unawareness of the details of Malcolm X, but I have a feeling that I'd be pissed if Spike Lee put that kind of slanted, plainly fictional motivation on the protagonist of that movie.
Wait, what? Facemash in the movie is pretty much exactly what it was in real life.
Here's one of the original The Crimson articles on it from 2003, which explains the functionality.
I don't think writing out the guy's girlfriend or having a fake girlfriend at the beginning call him an asshole makes it a hit piece. It sets the stage for the rest of the film, though, and for the story that they wanted to tell. She's a storytelling device, plain and simple, and her existence alone doesn't make the movie any more or less slanderous.
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MalReynoldsThe Hunter S Thompson of incredibly mild medicinesRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
The original Facemash had male photos as well; I think that's what Loren is trying to say.
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Yeah, I read back a few pages and I see that now. His argument didn't come across as clearly in the post I quoted.
Even still, I think that's irrelevant. Though FaceMash as shown in the film focused on females, it's obvious through his methods of ripping the images from the college facebooks that it would grab both male and female pictures, we just weren't shown any males on-screen. Is this really the a huge distortion of the truth?
If you focus on the narrative, taking the shortcut they did with the FaceMash story is an effective way of eliciting the same response in the viewer as Zuckerberg received from the Harvard community when it was released. It wasn't fraternities and groups of men who were upset about being objectified, it was primarily women on campus and women's groups. With the presentation in the film, audiences will likely respond the same way.
Whether or not they were attempting to push any sort of anti-Zuckerberg sexist agenda with this, I can't say. But looking at it from a storytelling perspective, I'm less convinced that they were trying to skew the story and more convinced that they were attempting to tell a compelling story without spending a ton of time on meaningless exposition.
On the issue of the veracity of the movie and whatever:
I haven't seen the movie yet but it seems pretty clear that the movie isn't really about Zuckerberg. Not thematically, anyway.
It's about our relationship with social media -- with the new and oft-celebrated world of social networking that has exploded in the last five years. I mean, really, this is a tremendously recent and fast-moving phenomenon that has real impacts on the way we live.
I think Loren is missing the point of, well, art. It's not necessarily about the literal subject, it's about the themes that are conveyed. The story is both a vehicle for those themes and a work of craftsmanship in and of itself.
I don't think Sorkin and Fincher are trying to make everyone go "hey that Zuckerberg guy is a real douche;" they're trying to say that social networking is something born out of a lack of true social understanding. The Zuckerberg character isn't really just about Zuckerberg -- he's a stand-in for the nasty social impulses of our current era, and what the creators of the movie see as the loathsome reality that lies at the heart of social networking: loneliness, self-centeredness, greed.
The movie isn't just a story about Mark Zuckerberg, it's a commentary on the value of social media, and an argument that social media is born out of the loneliness of our society -- that we're trying to replace something that can't be replaced.
That's what I've gleaned from what I've read about it anyway. I grant that I haven't seen it yet, but I have no doubt that whatever the themes are, the movie does have themes. It's not really a biopic.
Honestly I don't think Zuckerberg even comes off that bad by the end of the film. He's a dick, to be sure, but I think one of the last lines sums it up perfectly: "you're not an asshole, mark, you're just trying so hard to be". He was a dickhead to Erica in the beginning, and he was a dickhead about the blogging and facemash thing immediately after, but even the character-Zuck in the film expresses remorse at that, if I'm not mistaken. All the douchey things he does throughout the rest of the story (fucking over Eduardo, for example) can easily be taken to him being wooed by Sean Parker and getting caught up in what was happening to him. The court scenes paint him as more of just a snarky jerk than an underhanded thief or anything like that.
Honestly I don't think Zuckerberg even comes off that bad by the end of the film. He's a dick, to be sure, but I think one of the last lines sums it up perfectly: "you're not an asshole, mark, you're just trying so hard to be". He was a dickhead to Erica in the beginning, and he was a dickhead about the blogging and facemash thing immediately after, but even the character-Zuck in the film expresses remorse at that, if I'm not mistaken. All the douchey things he does throughout the rest of the story (fucking over Eduardo, for example) can easily be taken to him being wooed by Sean Parker and getting caught up in what was happening to him. The court scenes paint him as more of just a snarky jerk than an underhanded thief or anything like that.
Watched it, loved it. I don't think they painted a bad image of Zuckerberg at all. I really think that some of the things he did to Eduardo (like you seem to be saying) was partially because of Sean Parker, but also because of the fact that he realized he had something great and didn't want it ruined/destroyed. That vulnerability, imo, was what probably set off some of the actions towards Eduardo and why he was easily "swayed" by Parker (Though, I don't even know how real that might be). Jerk? Maybe. Thief? Absolutely not.
Honestly I don't think Zuckerberg even comes off that bad by the end of the film. He's a dick, to be sure, but I think one of the last lines sums it up perfectly: "you're not an asshole, mark, you're just trying so hard to be". He was a dickhead to Erica in the beginning, and he was a dickhead about the blogging and facemash thing immediately after, but even the character-Zuck in the film expresses remorse at that, if I'm not mistaken. All the douchey things he does throughout the rest of the story (fucking over Eduardo, for example) can easily be taken to him being wooed by Sean Parker and getting caught up in what was happening to him. The court scenes paint him as more of just a snarky jerk than an underhanded thief or anything like that.
Well, him leading along the twins about the Harvard Connection was a pretty dick thing to do as well.
I mean, he didn't steal their code, but he did pretty well take their idea and expand on it... In the process, he made sure that they wouldn't have a competing product.
Honestly I don't think Zuckerberg even comes off that bad by the end of the film. He's a dick, to be sure, but I think one of the last lines sums it up perfectly: "you're not an asshole, mark, you're just trying so hard to be". He was a dickhead to Erica in the beginning, and he was a dickhead about the blogging and facemash thing immediately after, but even the character-Zuck in the film expresses remorse at that, if I'm not mistaken. All the douchey things he does throughout the rest of the story (fucking over Eduardo, for example) can easily be taken to him being wooed by Sean Parker and getting caught up in what was happening to him. The court scenes paint him as more of just a snarky jerk than an underhanded thief or anything like that.
Well, him leading along the twins about the Harvard Connection was a pretty dick thing to do as well.
I mean, he didn't steal their code, but he did pretty well take their idea and expand on it... In the process, he made sure that they wouldn't have a competing product.
Arguably. He did lead them on in both the movie and in real life, but I don't think he really took their idea and expanded on it. The timeline in the movie sets it up as such, but from what I've read, there's been a lot of debate on which "came first", something neither side has been able to prove.
In my opinion, the only potential competition that he stifled is that of two social networks targeted at the same audience launching around the same period of time. The Harvard Connection was to be a dating site. TheFacebook's goal was taking the college facebooks and bringing them online, into a social network framework. This is an idea that predated The Harvard Connection by a longshot, and the idea of "university only" social networks had existed long before either website was thought up. Whether or not he did take anything directly from his meetings with twins to integrate into Facebook is something we'll probably never know, but it's hard to argue that he indisputably stole from them when their idea wasn't even slightly original in the first place.
I think Loren is missing the point of, well, art. It's not necessarily about the literal subject, it's about the themes that are conveyed. The story is both a vehicle for those themes and a work of craftsmanship in and of itself.
I understand that as well as anyone, I think. I'm also aware that art can have implications beyond art for art's sake, that there is a subject matter and a social context, that there are uses and fallout and unintended consequences of art, and that something being art doesn't necessarily excuse the meaning said art conveys.
Most people are going to see this movie, and they're going to know that it's a little fiction mixed in with a true story, but they're going to assume that most of the movie is pretty much telling them things that actually happened. They're not going to recognize the artifice, because Sorkin is a good storyteller and he wove it in seamlessly with the facts.
People are going to assume, unless heroes like myself are shouting on the corner or whatever, that Zuckerberg-the-real-Zuckerberg is pretty much like the guy in the movie, minus some sort of creative liberties taken that they don't know about. That Zuckerberg didn't have a girlfriend when he created Facebook, he made FaceMash as a girl-rating site, and felt like an outsider to the people in the exclusive final clubs. The movie paints a fundamentally different picture of him and his motivations than are true.
The movie is about the literal subject, necessarily, because that's how most people are going to take it. People watching movies like Catch Me If You Can or Malcolm X don't draw a strong dichotomy between movie-person and real-person, they just kind of assume the movie isn't lying to them and undermining or fictionalizing the motives and activities of the movie's subject.
The movie's artistic value doesn't excuse its dishonesty.
Honestly I don't think Zuckerberg even comes off that bad by the end of the film. He's a dick, to be sure, but I think one of the last lines sums it up perfectly: "you're not an asshole, mark, you're just trying so hard to be". He was a dickhead to Erica in the beginning, and he was a dickhead about the blogging and facemash thing immediately after, but even the character-Zuck in the film expresses remorse at that, if I'm not mistaken. All the douchey things he does throughout the rest of the story (fucking over Eduardo, for example) can easily be taken to him being wooed by Sean Parker and getting caught up in what was happening to him. The court scenes paint him as more of just a snarky jerk than an underhanded thief or anything like that.
Well, him leading along the twins about the Harvard Connection was a pretty dick thing to do as well.
I mean, he didn't steal their code, but he did pretty well take their idea and expand on it... In the process, he made sure that they wouldn't have a competing product.
Arguably. He did lead them on in both the movie and in real life, but I don't think he really took their idea and expanded on it. The timeline in the movie sets it up as such, but from what I've read, there's been a lot of debate on which "came first", something neither side has been able to prove.
In my opinion, the only potential competition that he stifled is that of two social networks targeted at the same audience launching around the same period of time. The Harvard Connection was to be a dating site. TheFacebook's goal was taking the college facebooks and bringing them online, into a social network framework. This is an idea that predated The Harvard Connection by a longshot, and the idea of "university only" social networks had existed long before either website was thought up. Whether or not he did take anything directly from his meetings with twins to integrate into Facebook is something we'll probably never know, but it's hard to argue that he indisputably stole from them when their idea wasn't even slightly original in the first place.
Valid points, to an extent. You have to admit though, getting hired to do the development work for a website, then not working on that one and putting up your own, arguably better, website is a bit snakey.
I do think the fact that the twins came away with $65 million for essentially an idea is more than fair...
People are going to assume, unless heroes like myself are shouting on the corner or whatever, that Zuckerberg-the-real-Zuckerberg is pretty much like the guy in the movie, minus some sort of creative liberties taken that they don't know about. That Zuckerberg didn't have a girlfriend when he created Facebook, he made FaceMash as a girl-rating site, and felt like an outsider to the people in the exclusive final clubs. The movie paints a fundamentally different picture of him and his motivations than are true.
Yes, it is very heroic of you to come here and continue to profess to a pretty smart group of people something that, even if we are not all that bright something we would have still known since page 2.
The movie's artistic value doesn't excuse its dishonesty.
Man, trips to the art museum must be rough on you.
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
edited October 2010
You are aware that one of the people who sued him SAID that he held the fact that he was passed over for the final club giants him, right?
It doesn't matter if Zuck did or did not care at that point; they are establishing the perspective of the prosecution with those scenes, just like there are scenes where Zuck clearly says that the final club nonsense had no basis in reality.
This film is not one linear set of facts from one storyteller.
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KoopahTroopahThe koopas, the troopas.Philadelphia, PARegistered Userregular
You are aware that one of the people who sued him SAID that he held the fact that he was passed over for the final club giants him, right?
It doesn't matter if Zuck did or did not care at that point; they are establishing the perspective of the prosecution with those scenes, just like there are scenes where Zuck clearly says that the final club nonsense had no basis in reality.
This film is not one linear set of facts from one storyteller.
I don't think we can get any more clear than this. If Loren still doesn't get it then I don't think he'll ever understand. The fact that you guys have been going in circles for 10+ pages is nothing short of amazing. :P
Either way, the movie is really good. If you can't accept that regardless of what may or may not be true, then I think you're looking into it too much.
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Mostly my issue is that it's still recent, or at least that's what draws my attention to it. It's a story that happened like seven years ago and is still pretty much going on in many ways. I'm sure I'm being at least somewhat hypocritical in regards to other films though. I'm less aware of the creative liberties taken with other biopics.
http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/31377
There's a surprising amount of attention to detail in that movie.
As a fellow dork I did end up discussing whether or not the iBook or Street Fighter 3 third strike cabinets were historically accurate.
That really seems off the mark. In the movie at least, Facebook was the manifestation of the idea that the college social experience is based on exclusivity, not the reason for it.
Even that doesn't really matter. The film was a character driven drama about an inscrutable asshole and a fortune that drove a bunch of bright young kids against each other. It didn't really seem to care about the importance of Facebook's effect on the social landscape beyond the irony of its creator being pathologically anti-social.
we get it
edit: Seriously, has this been three pages of you going on about the movie being fictional and everyone else telling you they get it? Because... we get it. It's fictional.
Edit: Also, the way gender is portrayed in media is a problem way beyond historical accuracy, and the suggestion that it's just because the author's a woman is kind of ridiculous and stupid.
Further, I don't think the division between truth and fiction is nearly as definite as you seem to claim (someone debated with their friend about the accuracy of the iBook and video game cabinets. That's a level of pedantry that's somewhat deep, isn't it?) There have been claims of deep factchecking here as well. Which is it? You can't have both.
However, I think that it's possible that my dislike seems to be the paranoia that a significant of the (at least critical) praise this movie is getting is because no critic wants to be seen "out of touch" with modern culture and facebook, that "they just don't get it". Especially when "it" is worth a gargantuan amount of money.
And again, I realize the book draws on more sources than the book itself, but I just want to remind you that someone who called themselves the next Hunter S. Thompson, wrote a book they claimed was nonfiction and then made up a whole bunch of shit, and then sold the movie writes for a probable large amount of money is at the center of this. Why not write a story about that douchebag?
Or maybe that's all irrelevant, because it's all fiction. And fiction is allowed to reference real world events and institutions and still be poignant and ironic and tragic. I honestly do not give half a shit about the real Zuckerburg. I assume he's not not a terrible person. He's just not relevant to my experience with the movie. Because it's all fiction.
Christ, it's not like most people who are loving this movie are loving it because they think it's a fascinating documentary about Silicon Valley or a representative creation myth for the social networking phenomenon or an accurate portrayal of an actual sociopathic billionaire. It's a character driven drama. And it's a really impressive one. And I wish people were talking about that, and not whether or not the movie is real. Which it isn't. Because it's all fiction.
Like every biopic EVER. No matter it is about some event last year or a thousand years ago. They all have some things that are made up.
Because they aren't documentaries. They don't intend to be documentaries or a factual account of someone's life. They are movies that have an intention of telling a story and, hopefully, be entertaining.
It's actually not all fiction, in fact the majority of it isn't. The blog by Zuckerberg was real, the lawsuits were real, the Winklevosses and Saverin's explanation of what happened was real (some of the dialogue were even direct quotes), everything that happened regarding Sean Parker was real, and I'm sure there's more. The movie is non-fiction with a fictional perspective on who Zuckerberg is, what goes on in his mind, etc. It's not hard to grasp this concept, biopics do it all the time.
This doesn't mean it's a documentary or the ultimate word on the subject, it just is what it is.
Of course it's fictional. It's also dishonest, and intentionally so.
You don't write out a guy's girlfriend, start a movie with a fake girlfriend calling him an asshole, and make facemash a girl-rating app without an agenda.
I'm sure this was written as entertainment, but it has the subtext of a hit piece. Perhaps this is simply my unawareness of the details of Malcolm X, but I have a feeling that I'd be pissed if Spike Lee put that kind of slanted, plainly fictional motivation on the protagonist of that movie.
I'm not seeing the grounds for calling it a hit job. Movie-Zuckerburg comes off worse than real-Zuckerburg, but who cares about the real Zuckerburg? Certainly nothing in the movie suggests its creators care one bit about the actual man or about the real Facebook. They don't even really seem to care about the implications of social networking in the first place. Maybe if the movie had themes of degrading privacy and the greed of the super wealthy or something, then yeah, maybe there'd be a basis for thinking the movie's liberties were intended to smear Facebook by misrepresenting its CEO.
Except the movie doesn't really care about any of those things. It's a character driven film that uses a cool idea (an undergraduate employs his entrepreneurship and genius towards becoming the world's youngest billionaire) as the vessel for human drama. So yeah, in that case, you do make the young billionaire genius an asshole. Or rather, you make him whatever you want to make him. Whatever works best to create the most engaging human drama.
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I don't think anyone would ever disagree with that. :P
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The Facebook was his sled?
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yes.
And it is a very good movie about the creation and rise of facebook, with minor liberties taken so that they can inject a drama into the story.
Never you mind what Loren is saying; it is not the 100% truth, but no biopic (or even documentary for that matter) ever really is. What it is is an entertaining story largely based on facts from court records and firsthand accounts.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
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The history of facebook is probably the most film like story of any startup that I know of, except maybe one of the dot.com bubble companies.
What really sells me on the movie is a comment made above about
This is exactly the kind of passive aggressive behavior I would expect from a bunch of geeks.
The movie critic from the Escapist gave it a rave review.
Here's one of the original The Crimson articles on it from 2003, which explains the functionality.
I don't think writing out the guy's girlfriend or having a fake girlfriend at the beginning call him an asshole makes it a hit piece. It sets the stage for the rest of the film, though, and for the story that they wanted to tell. She's a storytelling device, plain and simple, and her existence alone doesn't make the movie any more or less slanderous.
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Even still, I think that's irrelevant. Though FaceMash as shown in the film focused on females, it's obvious through his methods of ripping the images from the college facebooks that it would grab both male and female pictures, we just weren't shown any males on-screen. Is this really the a huge distortion of the truth?
If you focus on the narrative, taking the shortcut they did with the FaceMash story is an effective way of eliciting the same response in the viewer as Zuckerberg received from the Harvard community when it was released. It wasn't fraternities and groups of men who were upset about being objectified, it was primarily women on campus and women's groups. With the presentation in the film, audiences will likely respond the same way.
Whether or not they were attempting to push any sort of anti-Zuckerberg sexist agenda with this, I can't say. But looking at it from a storytelling perspective, I'm less convinced that they were trying to skew the story and more convinced that they were attempting to tell a compelling story without spending a ton of time on meaningless exposition.
I haven't seen the movie yet but it seems pretty clear that the movie isn't really about Zuckerberg. Not thematically, anyway.
It's about our relationship with social media -- with the new and oft-celebrated world of social networking that has exploded in the last five years. I mean, really, this is a tremendously recent and fast-moving phenomenon that has real impacts on the way we live.
I think Loren is missing the point of, well, art. It's not necessarily about the literal subject, it's about the themes that are conveyed. The story is both a vehicle for those themes and a work of craftsmanship in and of itself.
I don't think Sorkin and Fincher are trying to make everyone go "hey that Zuckerberg guy is a real douche;" they're trying to say that social networking is something born out of a lack of true social understanding. The Zuckerberg character isn't really just about Zuckerberg -- he's a stand-in for the nasty social impulses of our current era, and what the creators of the movie see as the loathsome reality that lies at the heart of social networking: loneliness, self-centeredness, greed.
The movie isn't just a story about Mark Zuckerberg, it's a commentary on the value of social media, and an argument that social media is born out of the loneliness of our society -- that we're trying to replace something that can't be replaced.
That's what I've gleaned from what I've read about it anyway. I grant that I haven't seen it yet, but I have no doubt that whatever the themes are, the movie does have themes. It's not really a biopic.
Watched it, loved it. I don't think they painted a bad image of Zuckerberg at all. I really think that some of the things he did to Eduardo (like you seem to be saying) was partially because of Sean Parker, but also because of the fact that he realized he had something great and didn't want it ruined/destroyed. That vulnerability, imo, was what probably set off some of the actions towards Eduardo and why he was easily "swayed" by Parker (Though, I don't even know how real that might be). Jerk? Maybe. Thief? Absolutely not.
This.
It helps that Sean Parker came across as a complete ass, so Zuck looks better in comparison.
Well, him leading along the twins about the Harvard Connection was a pretty dick thing to do as well.
I mean, he didn't steal their code, but he did pretty well take their idea and expand on it... In the process, he made sure that they wouldn't have a competing product.
Arguably. He did lead them on in both the movie and in real life, but I don't think he really took their idea and expanded on it. The timeline in the movie sets it up as such, but from what I've read, there's been a lot of debate on which "came first", something neither side has been able to prove.
In my opinion, the only potential competition that he stifled is that of two social networks targeted at the same audience launching around the same period of time. The Harvard Connection was to be a dating site. TheFacebook's goal was taking the college facebooks and bringing them online, into a social network framework. This is an idea that predated The Harvard Connection by a longshot, and the idea of "university only" social networks had existed long before either website was thought up. Whether or not he did take anything directly from his meetings with twins to integrate into Facebook is something we'll probably never know, but it's hard to argue that he indisputably stole from them when their idea wasn't even slightly original in the first place.
I understand that as well as anyone, I think. I'm also aware that art can have implications beyond art for art's sake, that there is a subject matter and a social context, that there are uses and fallout and unintended consequences of art, and that something being art doesn't necessarily excuse the meaning said art conveys.
Most people are going to see this movie, and they're going to know that it's a little fiction mixed in with a true story, but they're going to assume that most of the movie is pretty much telling them things that actually happened. They're not going to recognize the artifice, because Sorkin is a good storyteller and he wove it in seamlessly with the facts.
People are going to assume, unless heroes like myself are shouting on the corner or whatever, that Zuckerberg-the-real-Zuckerberg is pretty much like the guy in the movie, minus some sort of creative liberties taken that they don't know about. That Zuckerberg didn't have a girlfriend when he created Facebook, he made FaceMash as a girl-rating site, and felt like an outsider to the people in the exclusive final clubs. The movie paints a fundamentally different picture of him and his motivations than are true.
The movie is about the literal subject, necessarily, because that's how most people are going to take it. People watching movies like Catch Me If You Can or Malcolm X don't draw a strong dichotomy between movie-person and real-person, they just kind of assume the movie isn't lying to them and undermining or fictionalizing the motives and activities of the movie's subject.
The movie's artistic value doesn't excuse its dishonesty.
Valid points, to an extent. You have to admit though, getting hired to do the development work for a website, then not working on that one and putting up your own, arguably better, website is a bit snakey.
I do think the fact that the twins came away with $65 million for essentially an idea is more than fair...
Yes, it is very heroic of you to come here and continue to profess to a pretty smart group of people something that, even if we are not all that bright something we would have still known since page 2.
And still get some details about the movie wrong.
Man, trips to the art museum must be rough on you.
It doesn't matter if Zuck did or did not care at that point; they are establishing the perspective of the prosecution with those scenes, just like there are scenes where Zuck clearly says that the final club nonsense had no basis in reality.
This film is not one linear set of facts from one storyteller.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
I don't think we can get any more clear than this. If Loren still doesn't get it then I don't think he'll ever understand. The fact that you guys have been going in circles for 10+ pages is nothing short of amazing. :P
Either way, the movie is really good. If you can't accept that regardless of what may or may not be true, then I think you're looking into it too much.
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