The Social Network

Impressions before seeing it
The trailers didn't do a very good job of drawing me in. What I saw in all the promos was a lot of partying and rich kids and Justin Timberlake saying "This is our time!" and it looked like the type of schlock that fans of The OC would love. But now it seems like it has a very good chance of winning Best Picture at the Academy Awards this year, so I gave it a shot.

How was it?
I kind of already knew that Mark Zuckerberg was a douchebag. I remember an e-mail that got leaked years ago where he was bragging about having access to tons of university e-mails and such because, as he put it, "people trust me for some reason." I guess there's a chance it wasn't real, but then this movie was made and that personality still came through. Zuckerberg comes off as apathetic most of the time, caring more about his programming than the people around him, but at the same time I feel like it's trying to flaunt his achievements and portray him as the heroic rebel we all wish we could be, or something like that. The weird effect it had was that I didn't really like or dislike the character, he was just there - but played convincingly by Jesse Eisenberg.

While I'm sure many parts were dramatized, I found the story interesting because it went into Zuckerberg's hacking of university websites and how he took the idea for Facebook from someone else and improved upon it, then expanded it to more schools and subsequently got slapped with two different lawsuits. I was on Facebook back when it was only for colleges and universities, and that exclusivity was cool but opening it up worldwide allows everyone to connect to each other. There were and are plenty of other social networking sites, but Facebook just seems like the friendliest and most intimate one. Unlike its creator.

Recommendation
I still don't think it should win Best Picture, but I will agree with the nomination. It's a solid and engrossing movie, and you don't really have to be a fan of Facebook to enjoy it, nor do you have to be expected to like Zuckerberg's character.