SELF-MADE ENEMY

Before he created Facebook, Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg was just a condescending, self-righteous, my way or your sub-par-online-highway jerk. Or at least that’s what (The Social Network) director David Fincher wants us to think.

Mark (played with steely cold sophistication by Jesse Eisenberg) is so hubristic, it’s like watching a Greek tragedy. While his professional career escalates at a meteoric rate, he bulldozes through every personal relationship with complete nonchalance.

He offends perfect marriage material by insulting her inferior Boston University education. He steals ideas from fellow students. He hacks into campus websites, pirating photos and information in order to create something unique on his own, and once he does – he cheats his best friend out of billions of dollars.

No one will feel too sorry when Mark’s life (however undeniably successful) is whittled down to sitting in front of his own Facebook page, constantly refreshing to get “friend request” validation. But that’s how Fincher’s Zuckerberg ends up.

Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (who admits to threading some of his own yarn with his script) has created a relentlessly intelligent, near perfect bon bon of colorfully sarcastic scenes. The film triumphs with every carefully written “I’m CEO Bitch” line of dialogue (Mark’s well earned title and business card headline).

This is 2010’s Citizen Kane, where it’s just so lonely at the top of one’s self-made, friendless empire. Perhaps it’s karma that the person who created a website famous for connecting people is hopelessly socially inept and incapable of sustaining any real connection of his own.

Whether or not audiences relate to Zuckerberg on a professional level is futile. At a molecular level, as one lawyer says, Mark’s “not an a—hole.” He’s “just trying so hard to be.” And it’s impossible not to be mesmerized by watching him try.


- Hillary Smotherman