I’ll admit to having plenty of geeky and nerdy elements: I love ‘Office Space‘ and I once had a calculator wristwatch. With the entire world pushing for twitter, facebook and other social media, one might expect that I anticipated ‘The Social Network‘ unlike no other movie.
The truth is that anything that portrays today’s world through the current technological prism is not mature enough to be in a movie.
In the past, movies about the future were full of exciting predictions regarding technological achievements; when I watched ‘The Net‘ in 1995 everyone was raving about how fast all web sites were downloading. In a world of 14.4k modems, that was a tease unlike no other.
Unfortunately, a movie about facebook’s creation and success is like reproducing recent events – albeit blown out of proportion in order to achieve the ‘wow’ factor that is needed in order to sell theater seats. With the movie’s protagonist not even being an active facebook user in real life, one has to wonder what type of connection does a movie about ‘virtual life’ has to do with real life fans.
With regards to its valuation and role, facebook itself is way over the top; when in fact it’s simply a depository of an astounding amount of personal information. Despite the glossing over of its image, facebook is in fact an anti-social network; an illusion of proximity between people that are not only physically remote, they are often mentally and intellectually disconnected as well.
So much for being friends, tagging each other’s pictures.
On the other hand, ‘Middle Men‘ possesses the type of insight that ‘The Social Network’ lacks; it’s a film that does not pretend to mimic the pseudo-reality of the facebook movie but offers instead a rare view into the world of truly opportunistic entrepreneurs. Instead of tech/geek speak it’s loaded with realism, facts and figures about the online porn industry – the true powerhouse behind the Internet’s proliferation and success.
And yes, for better or worse, it does have a facebook page.
enjoy your take on things Theo. I only just began using FB months ago. i’ll not friend anyone who i’ve not met or spoken with in the real world before, so its actually my hallowed virtual ground, whereas i use twitter and linkedin for networking, building contacts etc. i see your point though. most people including myself dont talk to our own neighbors enough or make more real world connections in our own communities.
I have not had a chance to see either movie but really want to see Middle Men. Anything that covers the early days of the internet and how people interacted and how trends began in those days I find very interesting.
The Matrix had great timing when it came out and I think power ‘net users really connected with the movies underlying messages.
Mike – I fully agree with you on your criteria on fb, twitter and linkedin. The point I was making is more related to the illusion that many such “social” media platforms create regarding human relationships and interaction.
Hey Bill – Glad to meet another Matrix fan 😀 I recommend most of William Gibson’s books and the cyberpunk culture in general. With regards to these two movies, by all means go see them both; I wasn’t impressed by the fb movie, however, and it’s evident.