FRIENDSHIP REQUEST.

I was assigned to go see The Social Network for my Public Relations class. I enjoy this kind of homework. It does no harm to go sit in an overcrowded theatre for two hours and escape into the world of Mark Z.

Personally I love Mark Zuckerberg’s character in this film. But personally I don’t really have a big heart so that could go hand in hand. Throughout the film, Marky Z is displayed in a negative light. He is the meanest sort of 21^st century villain, he only cares about himself and is willing to eat everybody else up to get what he wants. He doesn’t need weapons he has brain power. BAM. But I found that the film would counter act his negative light with moments that would make you sympathize with him. In most of the litigation scenes I found it hard to dislike Mark because his lines were so witty. I was on Mark’s side throughout the whole ordeal. How can you argue with a guy that says the following to the Winklevoss twins, “If you guys were the inventors of Facebook, you'd have invented Facebook.” DAMNNNNnnnnn is all that went through my brain and heart at this point.

They wanted to display Mark as a bad guy, because that’s what he is but at the same time they need you to sympathize with the protagonist right? Hence when Rashida Jones’ lawyer character says to Mark, “You’re not an asshole, you’re just trying to be one.” This gives the light hearted members of the audience hope that Mark is just acting out to protect himself and that really he’s a great guy, which he is not. But he still has my vote for president of the world.

Facebook was already popular. I don’t think releasing this movie had much to do with increasing the users of Facebook. It’s just simply a really interesting story about the subject of Facebook which is practically a part of everybody’s life in North America. CASH COW.  If this movie made anything or anyone more famous it would be the actual Mark Zuckerberg. Could the real Mark Zuckerberg please stand up! He has done countless interviews during the promotional period of this film, which even included an appearance on Oprah. This was PR for himself, because he donated a bunch of money to a charity. HELOO HE DOESN’T WANT TO LOOK LIKE A NASTY JERK.

As already stated above, the release of The Social Network increased Mark Zuckerberg’s face time with the media, as he did a number of public appearances on talk shows. I think Mark could have taken two roads in dealing with the release of the film:

A.    Did what he did: spun the negative press about him into something good by donating money to charity as well as laughing the movie off as fiction

B.     Other option: to not respond at all

Now B may not seem like the smartest of options but it makes the most sense in correlation with who Mark Zuckerberg is. The Social Network film is based on the book by Ben Mezrich, The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius and Betrayal. In the preface of the book you read that Mark Zuckerberg declined to be a part of his book. The book itself is based on conversations with the other people involved in the Facebook scandals as well as information was decoded through studying the court documents. So when it came time for Aaron Sorkin to take this book and make it into dialogue magic, Mark again declined to be part of it. So why is he stepping up now? If he wanted to defend his imagine in the first place than perhaps he should have given his side of the story.

While Mark chose option A, I think he did a pretty good job. He seemed light hearted and funny throughout most interviews. Now the whole Oprah debacle with starting a foundation and donating $100 million to it on the opening day of the movie (prpost.wordpress.com)……. FISHY??? YES. Clearly the audience knows he is compensating. But if his money is going to a good cause it doesn’t bug me.

I think people will walk away from this film thinking that was a very interesting movie with an UNBELIEVABLE SCORE BY TRENT REZNOR WHO DESERVES AN OSCAR.  Also when they think of Mark they will be dumb founded by how rich he is and question how he could betray a best friend like that. Then they will go home and tweet about the movie, because no one really cares about Facebook anymore.