The Social Network

The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)

From the rapid fire beginning Sorkin's fingerprints are all over this tight knit, kinetic script.  It practically oozes the quick wit, intelligence and ambition he showed time and again on the hit TV series The West Wing, from acid barbs to classic put downs, no line is left to chance and under the guise of Fincher's imposing, classic and bling, flash, wallop mise en scene, sepia tones, inferred pessimism and defined spaces; dripping with the atmosphere of status, back-stabbing and privilege, his dialogue is able to dazzle with a narrative that's as old as time itself; the betrayal of your best friend.  However, The Social Network, is no Noam Chomsky diktat, 'old wine in new bottles', it's a living, breathing fresh take on a phenomenon that defines our generation, the birth of social networking, the rise of geek as power magnate and the way in which we live our very lives now.  Not then.  Not in the future.  This is a film that defines us.  How novel is that?

Yet, The Social Network works like a period piece set in 2003BF (Before Facebook), before our Internet addled lives, touch screen apps and i-pod dependence lifestyles kicked in and as such it's eye-opening to witness, to say the very least, the pace at which these things have changed.  Taken from the source novel, The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Mezrich, The Social Network charts the rise of Facebook (or 'The Facebook' as it was known before a well needed re-brand) and all the reprisals, the allegations, legal rows and boardroom dramas that ensued over the invention of one most profitable Internet sites, games changers, life moulders, of all time.  At most the synopsis of The Social Network looks dull - courtroom legal battles rarely make dazzling cinema time - yet this is Sorkin world and that just won't do, he finds his hook in the friendship of Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg, faultless as the bird nest haired automaton, driven by rejection and delusional self-importance) and Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield), their relationship and creation of Facebook, the inevitable lure of status, right up to the knife in the back and confrontations in the board rooms as they regurgitate their respective histories.
 

Before, however, there are the Harvard years and an opening scene so masterly executed that in one fail-safe swoop we have The Social Network spelled out to us as clinically as Zuckerberg's tact. As Zuckerberg sits in the bar, across the table sits his date for the evening,  Erica (Rooney Mara), they throw, no that's not right, they volley words and sentences at such speed to each other it renders the like of His Girl Friday or Bringing Up Baby to the status of the silent era.   It infamously took 99 takes to nail this scene to get the measure of Sorkin's words and Fincher's image to take shape from page to screen, with the aid of extreme editing and no doubt infinite patience on the behalf of everyone involved, this opening gambit plays out like a breakneck instant messaging board with social networking intensity.  Zuckerberg's guard is down and you can imagine a keyboard in front of him as he says these things but the real world doesn't offer the barrier that a monitor does, no anonymity, it's here and it's real, Zuckerberg wasn't made for that.

Zuckerberg is never more open than in this scene, for all the triumphs and humiliations to follow, nothing leaves him as naked as this moment, his social ineptness, superior exterior and awkwardness betray him as he walks time and again into faux pas, insinuation and insults, quite unaware of how what he is saying is coming across; in the classical style of Sorkin's script this moment of rejection becomes Zuckerberg's sole raison d'etre, his focus point for the uber-success to follow but will forever scar him and also, up to a point, define him. A final insult towards Erica's education leaves him reeling as the slow realisation of what he's said may have caused offence, the look of dawning awareness shoots across his face and in putting out a hand he asks, is this real?  From this refusal Zuckerberg, ignited by rejection and alcohol sets out the first Facebook prototype, after trashing Erica in his blog, he creates Facemash, a degrading, misogynistic site that allows guys to rate college girls against one another at the press of the button.  All of this is neatly played to one of Fincher's ongoing juxtapositions, a motif device he constantly refers to; where young men of status and privilege are seen paying young women to strip (to the wonderful score by Trent Reznor), it seems money may open doors but it's totally devoid of any class.

With Fincher at the helm, The Social Network feels classic, played straight and crisp with neat lines devoid of acerbic and wild fanciful touches, everything is confined but allowed to breathe, everyone has their place and like a classic play, play their part on cue, on the dot and within their space.  Though the subject matter is as modern as it gets, The Social Network is steeped in classic story-telling and Fincher matches this with a disciplined, stream-lined approach, shrouded in the same kind of haze that engulfed his previous films 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button' and ' Zodiac', each scene is measured to exude the exact emotion, ambition and cold animosity projected by the script and it's players.  It takes a tactician to film another tactician this intuitively and Fincher executes Sorkin's intelligent script with adroit panache and high technical skill, Zuckerberg doesn't grow, as with the usual bio-pic, there are no redeeming features, no facet of personality we can put hope in, he remains unengaged, anonymous, much like a mutual friend of a friend, and Fincher never once, much to his credit, makes us feel any differently towards him. 

Zuckerberg, in securing financial backing from his friend Eduardo and successfully delaying his involvement in the Winklevoss twins (both brilliantly played as the 'All American' Harvard alpha males by Armie Hammer in extraordinary CGI wizardry) rather timid site idea 'The Harvard Connection', sets to work on the website that will make his fortune, if not many friends in the process.  Eduardo's ease with people and with his money leaves a bitter taste with Zuckerberg, who resents those who he deems privileged and have an easy ride in life; he also finds the Winklevoss twins condescending and not worthy of his talents, when in fact it's his own inferiority complex mixed with a desperate need to be accepted by the cool kids that fuel his anger.  Add to this mix the smooth Sean Parker (Justin Timberlake), inventor of Napster and something of an idol to the inspiring Zuckerberg; who will turn to Parker in favour of Eduardo and infamously cut him out of the deal, and you have the full rostrum of players and victims that tore ground anew.

Despite this being a film based around the creation of multibillion dollar business, The Social Network is never about the money, sure the Winklevoss twins and Eduardo want their share but The Social Network is commenting on more than the delusion of power, greed is good or loneliness at the top.  At the very heart is the need for acceptance, the wanting to fit in and be appreciated by your peers, Zuckerberg is that kid being picked last for sports, the geek that never gets the girl and the lonely boy sat at the back of the school bus.  All Zuckerberg espouses for Facebook is for it to be cool, something he never could be and that ultimately he invents a key device for him to friend, or defriend, with as many people as he wants without ever having to socially interact with them, without the messy in person part.  Zuckerberg is a brilliant creation, a modern concept of something gone wrong within the human spirit, unable to communicate with another person without the medium in between, how app we leave him staring once again at the screen, typing away for another evening, all by himself.

Playing Catch Up - Best Films of 2009: #49 Frozen River

In this ongoing series,  I continue my countdown of the best films released in UK Cinemas in 2009.

#49 - Frozen River (Courtney Hunt)

For your consideration 

Blue in collar and earnest in its portrayal of desperate people driven by economic hard times, you could be forgiven, if at times, you feel like you're watching a 70's American Indie complete with stonewashed skies, social fatigue and a bleakness that permeates throughout.  That's not to say that Frozen River, Courtney Hunt's directorial debut (some 15 years in the making), is to be compared with the likes of Five Easy Pieces or Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore; it's a well made and executed low budget indie and, on the surface at least, it's a Sundance shoe-in, (where it won a Grand Jury Prize in 2008), however it does cover similar themes and issues that those 70's films stressed and captured, which suggests a cyclical pattern in American society now being caught by a new generation of film makers.

We follow the plight of Ray, played with understated panache by Melissa Leo, a stalwart television actress known for her star turn in Homicide: Life on the Streets, in a role that became her breakout moment, earning herself an Oscar nomination in the process, (fast forward several years later and another Oscar Nomination, for David O. Russell's 'The Fighter', bags an actual award, sending Leo's profile to superstardom), playing a mother coping against a plethora of troubles on the brink of Christmas. With a gambling addicted husband who's run off with the family savings, Ray is left to cope with two kids in a dingy trailer with mounting debts, a crappy part time job and the prospect of missing out on the families dream (and much needed) prefab house 'the double wide', Ray faces an unknown future with little money and escalating problems.

Enter Lila Littlewolf (Misty Upham), a Mohawk living on the Mohawk reservation, situated on a border crossing between New York and Quebec, also living a stark hand to mouth existence in the rough terrain, sleeping in a trailer that seems to be falling apart.  In Ray's attempt to find her husband, she witnesses Lila stealing the family car and gives chase, in a confrontation at Lila's trailer she is tricked into helping her by being told that she could get a good price for the vehicle.  It's the beginning a mutual relationship borne out of need and desperation, Lila in fact needs a car with a trunk (something she is banned on purchasing by the Mohawk council, which indicates that she's being doing this for some time and the power and influence the Mohawk's have over their own people) and dupes Ray into people smuggling across the huge St Lawrence river, frozen with thick ice, that acts as a border between the two countries.

It's the cold reality that these scenes are played which truly resonate in Frozen River, alongside the scenes on the inner workings of the Mohawk council, there is no room for moralising or debate within in these moments, Ray and Lila act, get paid and deliver the goods.  On asking why some of the people she's smuggling in the car trunk have had their shoes removed, Ray is told that it's to stop them running off before they've paid their owners back for the smuggling fee, often a ludicrously high figure that most people would struggle to see in their life time, Ray seems to ponder this news before shrugging it off, it's of no real concern to her, morals won't bring in the money.  Courtney Hunt's protagonists stare starkly into their respective broken lives (Lila is a widow and her only child is in the care of her in-laws who deem her responsible for the death of their son) amidst an overwhelming credit crunch, poor job prospects surrounded by harsh terrain which in turn drive them to extraordinary circumstances in order to fend off the inevitable, there is no room to question how money is made here.

Frozen River is a film of austerity with measured words and actions, short term goals such as your next meal, feeding your kids, making rent and ensuring all around you doesn't collapse at any possible moment become all encompassing and immediate; welcome to the America of 2008 for many people in Ray and Lila's position.  Even the shots of the sparse and barren land are frugal, nothing is ever given away and we don't bask in the beautiful frozen lake either, this isn't something to admire and breathe in, Frozen River at every turn wants us to feel the smallness of life.  From human smuggling, to despondent bosses (Ray's boss doesn't see Ray as a long termer, a reason he gives not to promote her despite working in the job for two years), gun toting gangsters and surly in-laws, the prevailing mode is one of pragmatism and all told with a minimum of emotion.  It's only the ending which betrays the otherwise stoic stance, a veer to the melodramatic in a move that still has its finger set firmly on the side of cold logic. 

So, a timely film and one of the first to show the current suffering in times of the credit crunch with its stranded and divided populous; Lila often refers to Ray as 'white woman' and knows of her worth if it happens to be Ray driving the car and not some 'Mohawk' when they pass a police car, taking whatever means they can to ensure they're not left behind.  It's a film about skating on thin ice, hardened emotions, tough lives; you can feel the dirt under Melissa Leo's fingernails and could easily lie in one of her drooping eyelids, yet there is hope in making whatever connection you can with fellow sufferers.  It's also a thriller and at times it's fist clenching, a night time job across the ice exposes some of the latent racism underpinning this part of the world, a bag belonging to a Pakistani couple may contain a bomb according to Ray, yet the contents are as far removed from explosive material as can be.

There may well be contrivance in the film's ending scenes, not to say some gaping plot holes, but it's far from a totally happy one, there's a real kinship between Ray and Lila and the audience come to care deeply about their respective lives and tribulations.  All in all this is a fine directorial debut, one that leaves you waiting for Courtney Hunt's next venture, which stays well long in the memory, not only for Melissa Leo's near silent tour de force, her assertiveness never fully masking her quiet desperation, (of course she should have won but it was the year of the Winslet after all) but for refusing to axe grind any political grievances or to sentimentalise the predicaments of Ray and Lila.  That's not something you can say about all Sundance Grand Prize Jury winners.

#48 Home (Ursula Meier)                                                      #50 Public Enemies (Michael Mann)

Stray Dog: A Country in Mourning

This is a contribution to the Japanese Cinema Blogathon hosted by the cool guys at Cinematon! Cinematon!, who along with others in the blogsphere are celebrating Japan's contribution to the world of cinema.  Please feel free to contribute to the week long celebration and share your favourite moments, directors and films from Japan and help to spread aid relief with every post for a country in need of global support.

(Akira Kurosawa, 1949)

The effects of an evident hangover subtly plays out in the background during Kurosawa's, detective procedural and noir styled, Stray Dog; a year before the international success of Rashomon (1950) and like the elephant in the room it's routinely ignored, best avoided and not to be mentioned, yet inevitably, can't help but to manifest, infect and permeate everything in comes in contact with. Kurosawa taps into a country's collective guilt, the consequences and moral questioning of its role in the Second World War, and where it turns now in the years of depression, occupation and shame without ever fully implying so. It takes 50 minutes for the word 'war' even to be muttered but ever since that unsettling close up of the craze-eyed dog, left out to boil in the mid-day sun, from the opening moments of the credit sequence, we've felt it's presence keenly, as if it never needed saying.

Set in the heaving metropolis of Tokyo in post-war Japan, rife with inner-city crime, a disaffected populous seeking solace in sake and cheap cabaret shows, jaded policemen and poverty, Stray Dog formally plays out like a police procedural drama playing with a film noir template. Murakami (Toshiro Mifune) plays the rookie cop who becomes victim to a pickpocket that easily steals his gun on a packed bus, ladened with shame and bound by the sense of honour so prevalent in Japanese culture, on top of his overwhelming guilt that still hangs heavy from his years of soldering, he offers his resignation which is swiftly refused by his bosses. Given this second chance he is teamed with Sato (Takashi Shimura, another Kurosawa regular) an older and wiser detective, in order to track down his missing gun which is now linked with a shooting of a young woman, sending Murakami into a frantic hunt weighed down by his own failings, history and guilt.

In trying to locate the gun, Murakami and Sato take a tour through the desperate social conditions of the country and the people that revel or sink in its murky waters. It's scenes, such as Murakami's montage through the black market that take Stray Dog to another level, not always reached by the generic film noir of the day, in which he brings the realities of this land into stark, bold focus rather than navel gazing at a rogues gallery of assorted low life, we get to feel that hardship on our back.  Early into their investigation, a name is attached to the shooting, a young man by the name of Yusa, dressed in a white linen suit, an ex-soldier from the war who had his identity stolen from him (his knapsack) on his return; it soon becomes apparent that Murakami could easily have been this man, his doppelganger, his alternative self, if life had treated him differently.

The war hangs on Murakami like a bad smell, his face (as always) a grimace, a fixture of torment and anxiety, never lets up and rarely can he look you in the eye without turning away riddled with guilt and shame. He's been fighting those demons daily and not sure if he's winning the battle, there's a vague notion that he turned to police work in order to battle those thoughts, after admitting that, at his lowest ebb, when he too had his knapsack stolen, 'thinking I was at a dangerous point, I chose this work (policing)' rather than following the road of Yusa on the easier one of criminality. Or maybe he simply didn't want to be on the losing side again. He's one of the nation's stray dogs, fortunately bound by character and morality, Yusa, like the dog in the opening titles has slowly been driven mad by the elements, by nature, by society. Half-baked.

The palatable heat of Stray Dog knits the film together, suture like, with a tense, claustrophobic edge, its noir credentials safely entwined in the world of the bustling, underclass cityscape. The city is coated in a constant layer of sweat, the humidity bringing a lot of the action to a standstill, protagonists having to fan themselves or devour ice lollies in-between sentences. Hot on the heels of their man, the closer, the more oppressive it becomes, clothes hang heavy, brows drip with sweat until finally they are within yards of him and the heavens open with a deluge of rain. It's a brilliant use of weather to measure the frustration of a brooding and angry nation, as well as raising suspense, a particular recurring theme that one will come to see time and again in Kurosawa's work.

Weighing in with the humanity of neo-realism, Stray Dog , ultimately, strives for redemption, belief and a better future; the belief that one can make a go of life with application and hard work. Murakami and Yusa are separated by fate, the cop and the killer; ying and yang, Murakami understanding this predicament better than anyone, 'There are no bad people, only bad environment' he tells Sato, after they had witnessed Yusa's living conditions in the small outhouse of his sister's home, not that his elder colleague shares his viewpoint, one of the many differences that separate the elder and après guerreSato and Murakami's different understanding of the same person underlines this Japan, at this time, in crisis.

R.I.P Sidney Lumet (1924 - 2011)

Here at By Kubrick's Beard we are saddened to learn of the news of the passing of Sidney Lumet and would like to take this moment to pay tribute to a very special director, writer and gentleman.

Quite simply there isn't much I can say except that the following clip, from the multi award winning and critically acclaimed Network, alerted me to Lumet's greatness when I first caught the film on late night television, purely by accident at a young age and well past my bed time.  

So, baring in the mind the thousands of similar tribute across the globe right now, this is all I will say on this sad occasion and just let the following clip sum up my feelings for Lumet, for what he brought to the world of cinema, for the sheer joy he brought me and for helping nurture my love of celluloid; it seems like the right thing to do.

Thank you Mr. Lumet and may you rest in peace.