I like to consider myself a bit
of a connoisseur of Oscar-nominated movies, so when I saw that the cinema was
airing The Social Network and Margin Call, two movies I had not yet
seen, I jumped on the opportunity. There’s really no need to say that both were
fantastic, although I preferred The
Social Network. What I really appreciated about the Themester showings at
the theatre were the varied networks each movie illustrated; where in one movie
you saw Mark Zuckerberg creating Facebook, easily the mightiest and most
widely-used “social network” of modern times, in another you saw a group of
financial geniuses deal with the biggest crisis their company faced in its
history.
I won’t lie, I could probably
make this post all about how beautifully filmed and how snappy the dialogue is
in The Social Network (Aaron Sorkin
is a screenwriting god) and not mention Shakespeare once, but there was a
massive parallel that sticks out to be upon reading Timon of Athens. Jesse Eisenberg, beautifully portraying a
college-age Mark Zuckerberg, unintentionally draws lines between himself and
Timon that I can’t ignore upon having read the book and re-watching the movie. Although
the account of the creation of Facebook isn’t entirely truthful, there must be
some truth in the tagline “You don’t get to 500 million friends without making
a few enemies.” Starting in the beginning of the movie, Mark progressively
alienates himself from the very few friends he started with, including Eduardo
Saverin, the co-creator of the website and Erica Albright, his (fictional)
girlfriend turned ex.
It’s not hard to say that
everything ended much better for Mark, no matter how fictionalized the movie
may have been. Their ends were all a result of wastefulness though – Timon gave
away his money wastefully, while Mark gave away his friendships wastefully.
Timon was too blind for his own good, and Mark was too selfish for his own
good.
Watch this movie though. So good.
Skylar, I like this idea of reading Zuckerberg alongside Timon--the move seems right, since Zuckerberg stands for fabulous wealth in our present moment., though he hasn't suffered anything like Timon's economic and moral collapse. And while I am not sure Zuckerberg's strained friendships parallel Timon's strained finances, Z is Timon-like in his withdrawl from social contact, and his inability to recognize any ethical folk who are still in his social network. In effect, Z has invented his own hermet-like exile through his lack of trust in others. All very intriguing!
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