The Social Network – a withapassion.com trip to the movies
October 1st, 2010 § Leave a Comment
There are many film titles worse than “The Social Network,” and many have been calling this film, directed by David Fincher and written by Aaron Sorkin, by other names. THAT FACEBOOK MOVIE, is how Nylon Men explains Jesse Eisenberg’s placement on their cover, where as Jon Stewart calls it “This facebook film.” “Facebookland,” I’ve joked, would have fit into the IMDB.com page of Eisenberg’s much more smoothly, alongside “Adventureland” and “Zombieland.”
These quibbles aside, The Social Network is the perfect title for this movie. According to the tell all that this film is baed on, Mark Zuckerberg’s lack of social graces and personal anxieties were the driving factor in the creation of Facebook.com. When I saw the film last Sunday, it was at a preview screening held by, of all things, MySpace,[0] and featuring a panel of the stars of the film and Sorkin himself. The popular arguments are saying the film is a statement against the rampant narcissism of the generation of young people who are social networking their asses off. At the same time, though, Facebook didn’t become the zeitgeist pwner it is until it opened up to the entire public. Farmville didn’t become a thing until your relatives could fill their hours with it as much as the Tracy Flick lookalike you went to college with does. Further, Sorkin himself doesn’t care about the technological aspects of the film, as he’s said every time he’s interviewed.
The film is about how something was created to simulate college social life, and ended up destroying friendships in the process. His script gives the tech prospects their due, as it had to, but it also knows that the meat of the story is Zuckerberg himself. The first conversation has Sorkin’s standard walk-and-talk dialogue style, pioneered in the Bartlett White House, but at a bar table, and multiplied to an amazing degree. Zuckerberg’s then-girlfriend is having one conversation with him, he’s having at least five with her. As an introduction to the character, the scene works perfectly, and tells you that your fears about a boring movie about website creation were completely misplaced.
The Social Network is being pegged by some as a Revenge Of The Nerds for the 21th Century, which isn’t lazy as it is incomplete. One of the best scenes in the film, wherein a Beck’s[1] pounding Zuckerberg, dejected from a breakup of his own making, simultaneously codes a website where peers can rate the looks of girls[2] on campus and blogs a petty rant about his ex, her body, and her family on his LiveJournal[3]. This will be pointed to for generations as one of the best depictions of the code writing process that’s ever been done. The layering of shots of screens that Fincher pulls off, where Zuckerberg is writing code in something called Apache, ripping photo libraries from different campus houses, writing blip after angry blip on his blog, and tying it all together with an amazing narration penned from Aaron Sorkin and delivered by Eisenberg. These aren’t your father’s nerds, they are angry, antisocial, and ready to sell each other out and down the river to get ahead.
Back in the club, though, Timberlake’s Parker doesn’t always work. His line delivery is excellent, but his story about a girl he couldn’t get doesn’t play as believable, because, well, Parker looks like Justin fucking Timberlake. The guy gives a great performance, but the hype surrounding it overlooks the fact that he’s frequently in danger of being viewed as blatant stunt casting. He overcomes expectations, but that’s not always something to be amazed by.
Finally, the movie’s secret weapon is Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross’ score. It keeps the movie pushing along at a furious pace, similar to the breakneck speed at which Zuckerberg’s brain is functioning. It’s mostly been kept from the public as Kanye West’s single “Power” is the song in the TV ads, and the choral cover of Radiohead’s “Creep” is the in theaters trailer song. Once people get ahold of the score, they’ll realize that Reznor’s still to be respected, even if Nine Inch Nails is retired.
This is all to say that while The Social Network isn’t the greatest film of the year (the title is still being held by Winter’s Bone), it offers a lot to all audiences, from the kids who’ll be checking into Four Square at the theater and their parents who, much like Justing Timberlake and Jon Stewart[4], claim to have no idea what changing your status means.
[0] The screening’s obsession with crowd sourcing the questions for the panel from MySpace, and doing no work at all to make sure the questions were worth the cast’s time, was a greater indictment of the youth than anything the movie has to offer.
[1] the award for product placement of the year, this is something Sorkin talked about at the Q&A. Initially, he liked the visuals and idea of Zuckerberg pouring himself a screwdriver, which would suggest drinking to get drunk. But, their researchers found out the exact beverage that was the Ambrosia which helped birth facemash.com, the predecessor to Facebook.
[2] Slate.com’s Luke O’Brien reports that the actual facemash.com was for rating the looks of both genders, so apparently, Sorkin took some creative license here and there.
[3] Which goes to show that these tech trends come and go. I mean LIVEJOURNAL? They would kill to be mentioned in any movie, much less the biopic of the internet generation.
[4] The Daily Show interview, 9/30/10.
How Pawlenty Got His Teabagger Groove On: Ever So Covertly
February 22nd, 2010 § Leave a Comment
Have you seen the clip of 2008 GOP VP-also-ran Tim Pawlenty saying the GOP should take the Elin Approach and attack Big Government (code for “A White House that doesn’t have a Republican in it”)’s car with a golf club? If not, hey, it’s above, and if I were you, I’d have watched the clip before I read the text, but that’s because I’m one of those cripplingly OCD cover-to-cover guys.
Now you’re either back or you hate me, and either way I can say this: I don’t think I’m going too far here to suggest that Pawlenty, once thought of as the last middle-of-the-road Republican, has become just another worried Republican who thinks throwing red meat to the teabagging right is what he has to do. That clip really did a lot to make me think that the teabaggers have the GOP by the teabags, at least when it comes to their public statements.
And that clip might not even be obviously red meat to you. Maybe I’m reading too much in on this one, but . . . well . . . I’m pretty sure that Pawlenty’s done the tidiest bit of race baiting we’ve seen in years. He’s arguing that the teabaggers, represented by their homogeneously white/racist/moron packs, should rise up against The White House, and naturally by entension, the black president living in it, who somehow is now the brand name for big government, after 2000-08 saw the Bush administration grow government like Mark McGuire grew his biceps.
Pawlenty’s said in this clip, that they the people, aka they the true AMURICANS, need to stand up to Big Government because it is a threat that warrants violence. This is just a more covert echo of the vile shouting that translates to “the evil black nazi commie is a threat to the white people.” But by the fact that he’s using the Tiger/Elin story as a prop, he speaks to the other radically racist right trueism that the blacks are coming for the white women.
Aligning himself with Elin aligns himself with the white woman Tiger was “allowed” to have sex with. Tiger is comprable to Obama with ease, as he’s the last time someone in this country demolished a race barrier that stood for so long. Tiger had been encroaching on territory he wasn’t welcome in on the golf course, and now that elderly white men have found out that he’s reached the double digits in their women as well as their golfing trophies, they’re pissed and they’ve had enough. Tiger’s had sex with more skeevy barroom white women than the bands Poison, Dokken, and White Snake combined, which makes him a danger, just like they’ve convinced themselves Obama is.
So what’s the point of this? I thought Pawlenty was the possible sane center of the tootsie-roll pop of nutjob that is the GOP. That he wouldn’t sell out decent moral/policy principles for a cheap laugh. That he wouldn’t get BushYearsAmnesia. But this means he’s not to be taken seriously anymore. Which brings me to the last thing to consider of having proximity to valid on the right: Ron and Rand Paul, the sort of out Ned, Rod and Todd Flanders of their generation. I’d like to see them take the reins of the party, but I bet that Ron Paul, who does tend to rant like a crazy man screaming at the clouds, has called more than a couple things retarded over the years, so Sarah Palin’s gonna squish him to keep the spotlight on herself, right?
HBO GO?
February 16th, 2010 § 2 Comments
Back in August, back when I had a functionality in me that left me able to write decent blog posts, and not just Twitter posts, I wrote a little piece called I Want My HBO, where I thought of a service called HBOnline where non-cable subscribers could get HBO content on their computer. It turns out, they had something in the works, but it’s nowhere close to what I’m looking for … yet.
HBO GO is what they’re calling it, and while I’ll admit that’s a catchier name, it also sounds like something you’d order at a sushi bar. Ehchbeeyogo?
But the real problem in their service as spelled out by their website at the moment is that you must be still attatched and suckling at the cable tv industry’s teat in order to get into HBO GO. This could change with the announcement that they’re going to make about the service tomorrow, (NYM via NYT) but I’m not holding my breath. I still don’t trust the telecoms not to have lifelong deals with HBO that are punishable by death if voided. If HBO thinks this kind of measure will stem the tide of piracy against them (see this wonderful essay from Astra Taylor from the new edition of literary journal The Baffler for more on piracy, and if you enjoy it, subscribe, damn it) they’re mistaken.*
HBO’s content, by and large, smashes the competition in the face with a brick. They used to be aware of this, you know:
So you lost The Sopranos, The Wire, Six Feet Under, and that show where the ladies loved their shoes and hated men; HBO, you’ve still got a lot to offer and a lot to get your superiority complex back about. True Blood is great fun, and it doesn’t even feel like a guilty pleasure anymore. Even though I hate on him, Bill Maher is one of the last frank and honest people on American television. The pretty funny Bored To Death is your weaker comedy show, because 1) you have the genius that is Larry David’s ever evolving Curb Your Enthusiasm, and 2) Eastbound & Down is just so amazingly fucked in the head I’m not sure what to classify it as. I know people that swear by Big Love, and you’ve got another David Simon masterpiece on deck, Treme. For once, it’s been proven that it can be a good thing to have the market cornered on old white guys, albeit geniuses who make you piss yourself in laughter or want to get piss drunk from thinking on how shitty the country can get. And I’m not even going to discuss the stuff that works for you that I just don’t think deserves it (Entourage, Hung, In Treatment, and Real Sports). But then again, you can’t be too great: you gave Joe Buck his own show. Also, you do reality tv right: by making documentaries.
Why did I just make a laundry list of reasons to fellate HBO execs for free on the side of the road? To remind them that they know how to do things differently, and to say, HEY, STOP MAKING THOSE WHO CAN’T STAND THE CABLE TV SERVICES HAVE TO PIRATE YOUR G.D. CONTENT!
*I can’t find the new Bill Maher comedy special from this past weekend at any online stomping grounds, so they’re getting better.
Kanye West And Serena Williams TOTALLY RUINED The American Civil Discourse.
September 16th, 2009 § Leave a Comment
You’d believe that if you’re the kind of person who thinks that daily periodical USA Today is printed by way of spraying truth dust on bible parchment. Judging by the fact that it’s the #1 selling newspaper, the odds are high that the average American might just agree with my sarcastic and misleading headline.
While they also threw Joe Wilson, R-SC on the page too, to make it seem like they’re not trying to paint black people as the reason for the peril of civility, I’d say that Joe Wilson should have been there, because he did something that actually matters. All Kanye West did was hurt a 19-year-old megastar’s feelings, and all Serena Williams did was threaten a referee with death by tiny yellow fuzzy sphere. Joe Wilson continued the hack tradition of misleading the public to believe bullshit about the healthcare debate that is simply and easily disproven.
In the House Bill, (Sec. 246) titled “NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS,” states: “Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States.”
A rapper and an athlete were rude, but their acts, albeit in the public sphere, are far from the DESTROYING THE NATIONAL FABRIC level of sin that the mainstream media (i.e. old white people in dead tree media, like David Brooks, who had to mention Kanye and Michael Jordan in the same sentence as Joe Wilson in his NYT op-ed today) are making these moments out to be. Also, their professions are in the Entertainment industry, which I think it’s safe to say Politicians should not be classified as, no matter how unproductive they tend to be.
Is there anyone that should be blamed for demolishing the national conversation that we’ve been led to believe this nation used to have and hold so near and dear to itself?
Well, I’d say all of us are to blame, at least those of us who don’t speak out when douchebaggery goes unchecked. We let our tempers undo our thinking for us, and it leads to a nation where the phrase “Fox News Channel” isn’t always followed by laughter.
A nation where one of my favorite funnymen, Jon Stewart, during his return from a three-week vacation last night, still thinks it’s great to make Black People Yell During Movies jokes (Jon, remember: you’re the host of a quasi respectable news show, you’re not Greg Giraldo scraping the barrel of obvious at the Comedy Central Roast of Flavor Flav).
A nation where science is on the verge of being outlawed below the Mason-Dixon line because Jesus isn’t in The Periodic Table Of Elements.
A nation where doctors at Planned Parenthood fear for their safety on a daily routine, simply because they practice legal medicine.
Simply put: we’ve got a tendency to walk around as a nation of haters.
Yes, Kanye is a douchebag, and the Williams sisters really get into the game of tennis to the verge of orgasm-sounding guttural noises on the court, but for both of these examples, they’re far from the only ones in their field who are guilty. Tim Commerford, of the sort of defunct Rage Against the Machine, was so offended that MTV, bastion of great music programming, gave an award to Limp Bizkit and not his band, that he stormed the stage, and scaled the set and had to be talked down from his temper tantrum, which lasted FAR longer than Kanye’s did. And in terms of Tennis, I only have two words for you: John McEnroe. But because USA TODAY needs to sell copies, they forget that everybody’s been shitting on each other for far longer than this almost over decade, and the especially vitriolic last summer.
And the public loves this stuff. Almost everyone on Twitter for the last two days has just turned into Kanye Joke Spam Bots, myself included. But there’s a simple line between joke and hate: anger. Where else is anger less stomachable and obvious than when the N word comes into play. Reggie Osse, twitter user Combat_Jack, spent a good part of tonight highlighting the guano-insane racism directed in Kanye’s direction on twitter.
It’s the responsibility of the adults in the room, who used to be the media, to step in and try to curb the anger and racism and educate people, back to sensibility, even if they’re kicking and screaming. But no, Glenn Beck, who I mentioned earlier, is at the center of this all, making himself filthy rich, not that CNN Headline News didn’t bring him there already, off of his 9/12 Movement, which is another phrase that the lunatic fringe The Birthers/Truthers/Lyndon LaRouchers/Tenthers/Deathers/etc. will be veiled in other than their real name: The Racists.
The rest of the non-Fox MSM, for the most part, gave a lot of coverage to the Glenn Beckers as they marched on Washington this weekend. Lately, in discussion with friends and family, I’ve shared my disapproval for the way Obama’s handling the health care reform. I think he’s been ineffective and too defensive. The same can be said 100 times over for the majority of the Democratic Party. What I do approve of, though, is the constant turning of the cheek that Obama’s given to the nutters in the street. I don’t know how I could have not, if I were in his shoes, spent my weekend throwing water balloons filled with piss at these groups, or at least had Rahm Emanuel do it for me. At least in this capacity, we finally have a President who displays the maturity we all should strive to achieve.
But yes, every moral high ground has an exception, and mine is Glenn Beck, who I will argue is one of the five biggest assholes on television.
I want my HBO
August 29th, 2009 § Leave a Comment
So I recently read that a la carte cable channel bundling isn’t gonna happen. I can’t find where I found it being debated, so I link to a google news search for the last week in this topic’s debate. And the economics make sense, sort of, for why it’s not feasible.
Here’s an idea that I think should be able to work, and it could put pressure on the major networks or cable in general, to make content to compete with HBO:
HBOnline. $9.99/month for access to streaming HBO channels and a Hulu-like resource to get at the HBO OnDemand material. You could even download to iPod/iPhone if HBO & Apple, both known for thinking differently, could get their minds right. And yes, HBOnline doesn’t make sense if you speak it out literally, it’s just a logo kind of idea. Hell, even make a less expensive paywall’d Hulu channel for HBO content! Something.
As you may know, I havn’t had cable for a few months. I think this experiment dates back to March. And depending on which channel we’re talking about, the withdrawl has been nonexistent to harsh. For Countdown and Maddow (MSNBC) it’s not that bad, as they tend to post full episode video podcasts to iTunes, FOR FREE, an hour or so after the broadcast is finished. Most everything else hits the digital ether by the next morning at the latest, which means I can set it up and have stuff ready when I get home.
HBO, and especially Real Time with Bill Maher, on the other hand, drive me up the wall. I assume the wait until the Monday after the air date (a Friday night) has some origin in the fact that even internet bootleggers need weekends off too.
Also, the use of the word bootleggers has some grounding in the fact that I’m not paying HBO for anything. Not supporting the artist, either, as Maher hasn’t done a comedy club in NYC in a long long time. HBO clearly wants nothing to do with a la carte episodes on iTunes except when DVD’s are also out, but isn’t it about time for them to shift the paradigm on the TV world again? Curb’s coming back, and aside from that, and True Blood, which I’ve gotten into, I don’t see much reason why HBO will be getting press any time soon.
