Afterthoughts: The Social Network

Two nights removed from the Golden Globe awards, the Social Network won four awards including; Best Picture(Drama), Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Original Score. Jesse Esienberg and Andrew Garfield failed to win Best Actor-Drama(Esienberg) and Best Supporting Actor-Drama(Garfield), but that doesn't mean the two wont pick up those wins at the Oscar awards coming up at the end of February. A friend of mine and I have often compared Esienberg to Michael Cera for some reason. I think a lot of that came from the fact that they've played similar characters and have a similar style of delivery in their lines when they're playing those characters. However Esienberg's roles have always been more broad and diverse while Cera pretty much sticks to playing the same person in every movie hes in. That's not a slam against Cera or anything, guys like Jack Nicholson, Nic Cage and Tom Cruise have made a career out of doing that. And while I do enjoy the occasional movie from those three the fact of the matter is they can't compare to someone as versatile as say Leonardo DiCaprio who does his best to completely become his character. Comparing Leo from the Departed and Leo from Blood Diamond, two movies released the same year, hes a completely different person.


Esienberg is the same type of actor. Hes completely different in this movie than he was in Zombieland, and perhaps my favorite movie of his right now, the Education of Charlie Banks. The only bad thing about his performance is that he makes Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg look like a total asshole. But at the same time the situation he is in, demands that. I've always herd the saying that the sharks swim on top. And that's what Zuckerberg is because the little guppy doesn't become the youngest billionaire in the world. Still back to the point, Eisenberg gives a career performance at only age 27. If he wanted to, he could retire right now knowing he has made it to the top. I'd assume that this will open up some doors for him in bigger pictures, with some bigger name actors. 


Andrew Garfield shouldn't go over looked in this film either. After watching this movie a few times I am about 75% sold on him playing Spider-Man. I rather wait until something tangible comes out from that camp until I decided if I can buy into him as the web-slinger. But as Peter Parker I have faith he'll be pretty representative of the hero, but still to me nearly ten years after the release of the first film, Toby McGuire is still Spider-Man to me. Anyway, Garfield too gives a great performance in this feature. I wouldn't call it a 'career' one just yet since I haven't seen a lot of films hes in, but it's still great. I love how he gets quiet near the end of his eruption on the Zuckberg character with the line. "I'm not coming back for 30%. I'm coming back for everything."


One of the real highlights of the acting is Justin Timberlake as Sean Parker, co-founder of Napster. It's still pretty funny to have a high profile music star play the person who the entire record industry had in their sights back in 2000. Timberlake however, is one of those actors like Eisenberg, he does his best to become the character hes playing. I've seen interviews and such from Timberlake in the past and for me his acting is almost nothing like how he is when hes out of character. From my perspective I hope Timberlake gets some more roles in films, hes a great additive as a supporting actor.

Another great part of the movie was the Score from Trent Reznor and Atticuss Ross. Quite impressive coming from someone whose never scored a film before. Every subtle note is in the right place, along with every powerful one. Honestly sometimes I get the feeling that the score made the movie as good as it was. Hearing some pop music behind some of scenes just seems so out of place with Finchers style. And of course the highlight of Reznor's involvement is what I called, probably his greatest piece of work in a while. And it's a cover of a classical song at that too. 

This clip from youtube doesn't do the scene justice but its there to check out. But everything about this movie just flows together so well. The Social Network is something I think will become as romanticized in the future as much as Citizen Kane is today.