Director Report Card: David Fincher (2020)

12. Mank

On the surface, a biographic film about beloved Hollywood screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz probably seems like blatant Oscar bait. There's nothing the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science loves to celebrate more than the history of (American) film. And yet, quite unexpectedly, “Mank” is a personal project for David Fincher. His father, Jack Fincher, began writing the script thirty years ago. It was a passion project for David's dad, who died in 2003. The director previously almost made the movie in 1997, with Kevin Spacey and Jodie Foster set to star. That version stalled and it was for the better. Fincher would finally bring the long developing project to the theater screens – or Netflix menus anyway – last year.

In 1940, RKO wunderkind Orson Welles was given complete creative freedom to make whatever movie he wanted. And the movie he wanted to make was “Citizen Kane.” He recruited Herman J. Mankiewicz, a known Hollywood hellraiser, to write it. Recovering from a broken leg and writing via dictation, Mankiewicz has sixty days to complete the script. As he works on the story, he reflects on his past. On his time working on the M-G-M back lot, where he butted heads with studio executive Louis B. Mayer and newspaper magnet William Randolph Hearst... Who would provide direct inspiration for Mank's script. 

“Mank” is a film overflowing with love for the cinematic form. From the opening minutes, Fincher shows his love and fidelity to film history. Cigarette burns appear in the corner of the screen before scene transitions. As Mank remembers his past, words from a screenplay appears on-screen to establish the time and place. The story isn't just about the making of a movie but also indulges in the cinematic language of the forties. Fedoras, classy dames, and lightning-fast dialogue co-exist alongside slightly chunky montages, antiquated titles, and wonky rear projection car rides. “Mank” isn't just a homage to “Citizen Kane” but to all forms of classic cinema.

The film's greatest homage to the golden age of cinema is Erik Messerschmidt's utterly gorgeous cinematography. “Mank” is shot in crisp black-and-white. The lights filter through the shades or glow from fire places in all the perfect ways. It's notable that the scenes set in 1940, as Mank is composing “Kane,” are lit in a more naturalistic – though no less gorgeous – way. The flashbacks, meanwhile, are painted in this film noir-esque paintbrush. This is another way “Mank” speaks to the power of the silver screen. Films are like dreams and memories, projected straight from our subconscious into theaters. “Mank” perfectly understands this, putting together amazing images to subtly presents the divide in its story.

Another pitch perfect homage to “Mank's” era is the fantastic score. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross' score is full of foreboding pounding piano notes, ominous strings, and mournful horns as intentional callbacks to “Kane's” widely famous score. Yet there are also more playful moments in the score, with almost mischievous sounding notes and melodies or boozy bass. When the time comes, Ross and Reznor also up the dreamier sounds, mostly during Mank's creative moments. Not only does the music bring “Kane” to mind, without directly quoting it, it also so perfectly sounds like the 1940s to me. Maybe not the real forties but at least the one that exists in the old movies. 

More than anything else, “Mank” is a beautiful homage to a real life hero. Herman J. Mankiewicz was a silver-tongued man that was always ready to speak truth to power. All throughout the film, he takes every opportunity he can to call people like Mayer and Hearst on their bullshit in his own sly manner, in such a way that sometimes people don't notice he's insulting them. In the final act, Mank becomes representative of every other unrepresented talent in Hollywood. As he demands to receive credit for writing “Kane,” he even stands up to his own director, the man writing his checks. Mank represents someone determined to stand up for what's right, even when it costs him.

Bringing Mankiewicz to life is Gary Oldman. Oldman is the perfect person to embody Mank's acerbic wit. Oldman has the ideal handle on the fast-paced dialogue. He cuts into every one of Mank's witty turns-of-phrase with the perfect amount of sardonic glee. Even in his most self-destructive moments, like the titanic drunken rant that provides the film's climax, Oldman retains that fantastic sense of humor that makes Mank so goddamn likable. Yet he has quiet moments too, self-deprecating moments, that expose the softer side of this man. Say what you will about Oldman as a man but he's a terrific actor. This may be his best performance yet, combining his gift for bombast with a more restrained abilities. 

Of course, like all great men on the silver screen, Mank has his demons too. He's an alcoholic, constantly struggling to stay dry. He's depicted as blind drunk multiple times throughout the story. Even while recovering from the broken leg, he convinces the house caretaker to slip him bottles of lodium. He's also a compulsive gambler, making bets on random coin tosses and leaves falling out of trees. Yet these flaws cover up insecurities, like the guilt he feels over falling to prevent a friend's suicide. Or a time his sarcasm backfires on his stenographer. This is not the only way he tries to make-up for past mistakes. He also personally paid to transports the same housekeeper's village out of Nazi Germany, an act he insists on keeping secret. He was, to put it simply, a complicated man.

While Oldman's Mank obviously dominates the film, he is backed up by an impressive supporting cast too. Amanda Seyfried has never been better utilized here, as Marion Davis. Hearst's girlfriend of the time, Seyfried is utterly delightful. She can wrestle with the stylized dialogue while being perfectly charming the entire time. Lily Collins is well-utilized as the stern but fragile counterpoint to the exaggerated figures of Mank's memories. Charles Dance's deeply intoning voice, used sparingly, makes Hearst a towering and intimidating figure. And Tom Burke does a damn good Orson Welles impersonation, who is smartly kept as this mythic off-screen icon for most of the movie.

A film about screenwriters in the thirties and forties probably doesn't seem like a very relevant story to our modern world. Yet “Mank” also reflects on our own times in interesting ways. A subplot in the film involves the upcoming election between socialist Upston Sinclair and conservative Frank Merriam. Merriam demands that M-G-M produce propaganda reels to discredit Sinclair. The testimonial in the news reel are actors, a black man and a German cast as the Sinclair supporters. This is, in other words, fake news. Fincher and his team make sure to target the real root behind these deceptions. Millionaires like Hearst put the pressure on people to enforce their worldview, to make sure who they approve of stay in power. This is made all the more apparent in a shared anecdote from a supporting character about being physically intimidated by Boss Tweed goons as a boy. The rich use force – intellectual or literal force – to get what they want.

From a particular angle, “Mank” probably seems like one great big reference to “Citizen Kane.” The film is actually pretty subtle about this. Obviously, the musical score and the visuals are heavily inspired by the Welles' classic. Yet Fincher makes sure to include several specific homages to the original movie. Such as a bottle falling from Mank's hand mimicking the infamous snow globe image from “Kane.” Motifs that were present in that film, like flashing light bulbs or mirrors, reappear here as well. The shadow drowned mansion that is the film's climatic location obviously owes a debt to Kane's Xanadu. Yet “Mank” is far more than the “Citizen Kane” fan-film it sounds like on paper.

That Fincher would make a feature length homage to “Citizen Kane” is, in retrospect, not too surprising. One can see shades of Welles' classic in the black-and-white images of so many of Fincher's early music videos. Finding where “Mank” fits into the thematic concerns of Fincher's career is a little trickier. There's no grand conspiracy or criminal masterminds at work here. Instead, “Mank” continues to show the director's interest in exploring the psychology behind difficult people. Mank isn't a mysterious killer, a plotting femme fatale, or a cold-hearted tech billionaire... But he is yet another Fincher protagonist that is uncompromising in his vision, that damn near destroys himself as he moves forward with a single-minded determination towards his goal.

Debuting among much hype, “Mank” had a somewhat lukewarm reception among a lot of critics and especially the Film Twitter/Letterboxd tastemakers crowd. I don't know if people were expecting more from Fincher or if a story about old white guys seemed especially irrelevant in 2020. (Though it's not) The movie still managed to grab the most of all Academy Award nominees this year, winning several in the technical categories. In ten years or so, I think “Mank” will be better received. It's a gorgeous and brilliant homage not just to “Citizen Kane,” not just to all of movie-making, but especially to the irrepressible spirits that make this business we call show possible. [Grade: A]

David Fincher has been attached to an almost countless number of unrealized projects over the years. I guess that's what happened when you're one of the most respected filmmakers in Hollywood. A few come to mind for me as especially interesting: Adaptations of comic books, like Frank Miller's “Hard Boiled” or a new version of “Heavy Metal,” or classic novels, like Arthur C. Clark's “Rendezvous with Rama.” Around the time he was working on “Zodiac,” he was attached to a comic-inspired film about another uncaught serial killer: The Cleveland Torso Murderer. 

Even though his movies aren't exactly known for mindless thrills, the director has still been attached to would-be blockbusters as well. Such as a big budget Disney movie based on “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea,” a new version of “Cleopatra” with Angelina Jolie, and even a sequel to “World War Z.” (One assumes Fincher got attached to that as a favor to his buddy Brad Pitt.)

None of these came to fruition, so whose to say what will actually be next for the director? Yet it's increasingly looking like his next project will re-team him with Andrew Kevin Walker. It's another off-beat comic adaptation called “The Killer,” inspired by a French comic, about the life story of a hitman. After backing the series “Mindhunters” and “Mank,” Netflix seems ready to back the bill for that long-simmering project as well. I'm looking forward to it, as this project renewed my interest in the filmmaker. Go figure, this David Fincher guy is actually pretty talented.

RECENT WATCHES: The Girl in the Spider's Web (2018)

When David Fincher's “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” disappointed at the box office, plans to move forward with adaptations of “The Girl Who Played with Fire” and “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest” were quickly abandoned. (Much to the chagrin of Rooney Mara, who seemed eager to reprise the character.) Instead, Sony decided to go in a different direction. After Stieg Larsson's death, author David Lagercrantz would be chosen to continue the literary adventures of Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist. “The Girl in the Spider's Web” was the first of these new novels. Presumably to cash in on the hype of this new release, Fede Alvarez would be hired to direct an adaptation. The lead roles would be recast with Claire Foy and Sverrir Gudnason, the film acting as a reboot of sorts of the would-be franchise. 

Since we last saw her, Lisbeth Salander has become a for-hire hacker and vigilante. A program architect named Balder hires her to retrieve Firefall, a program he designed for the N.S.A. that can hack any nuclear code in the world. Lisbeth successfully steals Firefall but cannot crack its cryptic interface. A group of mercenaries nearly kill Lisbeth when they steal Firefall back, before murdering Balder and framing her for the crime. Salander once again enlists the help of journalist Mikael Blomkvist, who quickly uncovers the responsible party: Camilla Salander, Lisbeth's twin sister who took over their gangster father's business. Now a race is on to retrieve Balder's genius son, who knows the secret to unlocking Firefall. 

“The Girl in the Spider's Web” sets out to refit Lisbeth Salander for the modern cinematic landscape of superhero blockbusters. Her introductory scene has her visiting justice, as a vigilante in face-paint, on a rich businessman who abuses women. The film introduces a colorful supervillain for her to fight, in the form of an evil twin. Camilla even has a contrasting visual design to Lisbeth, with blonde hair and bright colors. Her hacking abilities get turned into a superpowers of sorts, as she somehow uses it to deploy the airbags in a pursuer's car at one point. Much like James Bond, Salander is chasing after a world-breaking MacGuffin. The bad guy's goals is nothing more than to plunge the world into chaos. The film even includes an elaborate Bond-ian opening credits sequence, though it skips a chart-topping theme song. Another Bond-like touch has Lisbeth being placed into a death trap, via an asphyxiating fetish vacuum bag.  

Trying to squeeze this character into this mold is, admittedly, kind of a weird choice. Even if they were pulp at heart, Stieg Larsson's books attempted to address serious topics like government corruption, sex trafficking, and fascism. They were talky mysteries with a lot of detail-choked digressions. “The Girl in the Spider's Web,” notably, doesn't seem to be about anything more than its contrived story beats. Then again, the movie makes little attempts to connect itself to any previous version of these characters. The events of “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest” are vaguely referenced, I think, but this film outright contradicts what we previously earned about Lisbeth's childhood. Millennium Magazine plays such a small role and Lisbeth and Blomkvist's relationship is strained, for some reason. The film floats in this weird space, not quite a sequel and not quite a reboot. It's distracting. 

You can debate the ethics of turning the Millennium Trilogy into an action movie. Yet at least director Fede Alvarez makes sure it's all pretty good action. There's a shoot-out, a big explosion, and a motorcycle chase across a frozen lake all within the first half-hour. An intense fight scene with an intimidating henchman in a bathroom recalls the tense scenes of violence in cramped location in Alvarez' “Evil Dead” remake and “Don't Breathe.” The highlight of the movie is the big car chase that follows, which concludes with a tense stand-off on a bridge. The climax involves another vehicular stunt, when a car is sent spinning through the air into some trees. Alvarez and cinematographer Pedro Luque insures the movie looks good too. The snowy whites of Sweden are emphasizes, along with many other bold color choices.

Lisbeth Salander is the kind of role that attracts a certain breed of actress: Petite but intense. Claire Foy proves to be a good choice in that regard. She has the ability to project a vulnerability behind the steely veneer of stoicism. Honestly, I like her a little better than Roony Mara, though she still trails behind Noomi Rapace. If the reboot finds a capable Lisbeth, it completely drops the ball with Blomkvist. Sverrir Gudnason seems way too young in the part and has absolutely no charisma or screen presence at all. He's a complete blank. Better are Sylvia Hoeks, sinister as Camilla, and LaKeith Stanfield as the NSA agent who weaves in and out of the story. His role is probably unnecessary but Stanfield at least brings some attitude to the part.

“The Girl in the Spider's Web” did not do very well at the box office, grossing only 35 million dollars against a 43 million dollar budget. It seems the studio's desperate attempt to turn Lisbeth Salander into an action hero was all for naught. The literary continuation of Larsson's story proved more successful, as Lagercrantz has written two more novels about Salander and Blomkvist. Perhaps American cinema-goers just aren't that interested in the grim thrills that these characters are built around. “The Girl in the Spider's Web” does a few things well but ultimately can't cohere into a satisfying whole. [6/10]

Director Report Card: David Fincher (2014)

11. Gone Girl

You know a work has achieved a major level of fame when it contributes to our larger cultural lexicon. Upon release in 2012, Gillian Flynn's novel “Gone Girl” immediately became a bestseller. It generated a countless number of thinkpieces and essays about what it said about gender, marriage, and the media. Moreover, it added the phrase “cool girl” to our pop culture vocabulary. The film rights to the book were scooped up before it was even published, with Reese Witherspoon's production company developing it as a project for her. Flynn herself wrote the first draft, which attracted David Fincher's attention. Fincher would ensure that the feature adaptation of “Gone Girl” would generate as much debate and interest as its literary predecessor.

Nick and Amy once had a great marriage, full of passion and spontaneous sex. That was a few years ago now, before they moved to Missouri, before Nick's mom died and before their careers dried up. On the day of their fifth anniversary, Nick returns home to see his wife has vanished. The police are immediately suspicious of him, with more incriminating evidence against Nick piling up. As Amy was a minor celebrity, the inspiration for a long-running series of children's books, her disappearance becomes a major news story. Despite all the clues pointing to it, Nick didn't kill his wife... And Amazing Amy is far from done with him.

It's easy to see why “Gone Girl” would appeal to David Fincher, as it's another story of a calculating psychopath with a convoluted master plan and the people caught up in the ensuing conspiracy. Yet even this is not what “Gone Girl” is really about. First and foremost, this is another entry in the proud American tradition of melodramas about decomposing marriages. We see Nick and Amy's first date, how they had immediate chemistry, how he quickly charmed her. How they used to have great sex all the time. How her games on their anniversaries used to charm and entrance Nick. Since then, resentment and complacency has sneaked into their home. She wants a baby, he's having an affair. Both quickly realize that neither person is who the thought they married. This is the discomforting place “Gone Girl” begins to tell its story.

Yet this is only where "Gone Girl" is beginning. The first half-hour of this movie gives you the impression that you are watching one kind of film. It appears to be a story about how a disappearing wife incriminates her husband, the question of whether he actually killed her, and the resulting media attention. This is before the reveal that Amy is alive. That she not only disappeared on her own but utilized an elaborate plan to frame Nick for her murder. It's the first of a series of brilliant twists, "Gone Girl" drawling you more and more into its story. Wherever you think the film is headed at the beginning, it ends in an entirely different place.

Gillian Flynn herself wrote the script, her debut screenplay, after Fincher insisted she continue to work on the film after the first draft. I've never read any of Flynn's novels but it's apparent that she has a very distinct voice. The dialogue in "Gone Girl" is often sharp, exaggerated, and hilarious. Amy's voiceover narration is so keenly observed. The back-and-forth Nick has with his twin sister, Margo, is immediately likable and funny. When a high-price, high-powered lawyer enters Nick's life to rehabilitate his image, more witty lines are fired at us. Flynn also knows when to drop profanity. Amy describing Nick's girlfriend as having "cum-on-me tits" is vividly descriptive. The use of the c-bomb in a later scene is also extremely effective. 

The most memorable of Flynn's words is the "Cool Girl" monologue that captured so much attention in 2014. In the span of about three minutes, Flynn vividly details the insane archetypal roles that men force women to conform to. That women sometimes conform to themselves, in order to please these men. You can't help but feel sorry for Amy, and so many women all over the world, for having to deal with such a ridiculous double-standard. She kills this "cool girl" version of herself when she pours a pint of blood on the kitchen floor. She scarfs snack food and drinks soda, finally free of the ludicrous standards of maintaining the cool girl's size 2 figure. As she details the ridiculous illusion she had to maintain to please Nick, you can't help but feel like maybe he deserves what she's doing to him. Maybe every dude deserves it. 

But "Gone Girl" is only beginning to pull rugs out from under you at this point. Because Amy isn't an avenging woman who strikes back at the sexist system that oppresses her. She's a stone-cold psychopath, who has engineered an elaborate scheme to ruin her husband's life. She hocks a loogie into a person's Mountain Dew after they indirectly insult her. She framed an ex-boyfriend for rape. When the wheels start to come off Amy's master plan, when it looks like Nick has won over the public that has condemn him, she devises another insane plan to frame another man, which plays out in the most brutal way possible. In "Gone Girl," we see a femme fatale's story from the inside out. Flynn uses this to attack another troubling role society forces women into. If "Gone Girl" decimates the "cool girl" archetype, it also burns down the idea of women being feminist avengers by extending the idea to its most terrifying extreme. Amy is neither cool girl nor an "empowered" woman, suggesting both roles are equally damaging. 

"Gone Girl" is also a brutal condemnation of the media, playing like an absurd and pitch-black satire of the tabloid news cycle we are constantly embroiled in. Why Amy Dunne's disappearance attracts so much attention, when people disappear every day, is obvious. She's white, blonde, attractive, rich and famous. The media attention is largely driven by Ellen Abbott, a barely exaggerated version of Nancy Grace. They attack Nick for not being sad enough, even though everyone reacts to stress differently. Abbott makes salacious implications on her talk show, saying that Nick's not just a murderer but in an incestuous relationship with his sister. Of course, the minute the narrative changes, and Nick's innocence is assured, the media leaps on that too. The tabloid journalists are only interested in the scandal and the happy endings. They have no desire to dig into the inconsistencies just below the surface in Amy's story. Few people are interested in the truth and more interested in the "story" being presented.

"Gone Girl" operates like a beautifully executed mystery, always pulling you deeper as more information is revealed or more clues are uncovered. Every big pay-off – from a shed full of expensive gifts to the detailed explanations of how Amy pulled off her scheme – is deployed perfectly, hitting the audience in the face in the best way. As we see Amy start to set-up her next evil scheme, “Gone Girl” spirals towards a shocking and disturbing climax. It's a sudden act of gruesome violence, catching the audience off-guard no matter how much it's foreshadowed. And then, interestingly, the movie continues further past this point then you'd expect. “Gone Girl's” ambiguous ending, Amy getting her revenge on Nick in a round-about way, re-enforces its central idea: Of people forced to pretend to be someone else while trapped in a bitter marriage, leaving the audience with a unsettled feeling.

Ben Affleck stars as Nick. Affleck brings a certain meta context to the role that is unavoidable. The star has certainly had his own run-ins with the tabloid media. Around the time he was filming “Gone Girl,” he got cast as Batman. A sharp-eyed viewer can spot his physique growing more muscular throughout the film. Not too long after that, Affleck's personal life was rocked by divorce, rumors of affairs, a stint in rehab for alcoholism, and a horrible back tattoo. In other words: Ben Affleck has big Mid-Life Crisis Energy and the film makes ideal use of it. In the beginning, we can never be too sure if we trust Nick. If what Amy says about him is true or if he's been framed. Affleck certainly can capture the image of a big dopey guy, who doesn't know not to smile when talking about his missing wife on TV. Yet you can see some of the charm that made Ben a movie star in the first place, during the interview when Nick takes control of the narrative. In other words, Ben Affleck is used perfectly in the film, the baggage around him as a performer actually enhancing the movie.

Considering her producer's credit on the film, one assumes Reese Witherspoon originally had eyes on playing Amy. It's pretty easy to imagine what the Reese version of Amy would look like. (Like an older, more fucked-up Tracy Flick probably.) Instead, Rosamund Pike would slot into the role after Reese disagreed with Fincher's ideas for the character. Unlike Affleck – or Witherspoon, for that matter – Pike brings no preconceived notions to her character. Pike disappears totally into Amy, a character whose alliances are hard to guess. Pike certainly brings the right venom and anger to Amy's monologues, slowly revealing the character's sociopathic tendencies with a terrifying deliberateness. 

“Gone Girl” also features a cast full of surprising faces. None more than Tyler Perry as Tanner Bolt, the lawyer Nick hires to turn the public opinion around on him. Perry is actually pretty good in the role, fittingly charismatic as a man very used to smoozing in the right way and playing to the right crowds. Neil Patrick Harris is also cast very against type as Desi, Amy's obsessive ex-boyfriend that she weaves back into her scheme. Harris brings the same slightly haughty quality, that we've seen in roles like Doogie Howser or Dr. Horrible, to a ridiculously overconfident and utterly clueless rich dork. Missi Pyle is hilarious as Ellen Abbott, simply by playing the Nancy Grace schtikc more-or-less straight, the ridiculousness of the inspiration becoming all the more obvious. I also really liked Carrie Coon as Margo, who is funny and sure-headed as Nick's more grounded sibling.

With typically sharp direction from Fincher, making use of washed-up lightning and shadowy angles, and a low-key but effectively spooky score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, “Gone Girl” stands as one of the best films of the director's career. It generated rave reviews and controversary in 2014, some even accusing the film of being sexist. Despite being one of the best movies of the year, it only scored a single Oscar nomination, a Best Actress nod for Pike. But, then again, the Academy has always been slow to acknowledge Fincher's thrillers, no matter how brilliantly executed they may be. An Oscar is no guarantee a movie will endure, while the type of brilliance on display in “Gone Girl” almost certainly is. [Grade: A]

Director Report Card: David Fincher (2011)

10. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Considering its status as a international best-seller which already launched a successful series of films overseas, it was only a matter of time before Hollywood studios made their own adaptation of Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy of novels. Pre-production on an American “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” actually started as early as 2009, before the Swedish films were even released over here. Trying to get David Fincher to direct this movie seems like such a natural choice, you almost can't imagine the director going for it. Gritty, noir-ish murder-mysteries with extreme themes are so far within Fincher's wheelhouse, he's almost too obvious a choice. Obvious or not, Fincher would sign on quickly and the movie was fast-tracked for a 2011 awards season release date. 

Mikael Blomkvist, head writer and co-owner of Millennium Magazine, has recently been convicted for libel after publishing supposedly false accusations against millionaire Hans-Erik Wennerström. This is when elderly industrialist Henrik Vanger hires him to investigate the murder of his beloved niece, Harriet. She disappeared in 1966 while a car wreck blocked off the entire island. Blomkvist goes about investigating the sordid history of the family. Blomkvist soon teams up with Lisbeth Salander, the mysterious computer hacking prodigy who did a background check on him. Together, they dig into the past and discover that Harriet Vanger is not the only dead girl in the family. Among the businessmen and Nazis is a serial killer.

David Fincher continues to have the best trailer editor in Hollywood. On the footsteps of “The Social Network's” award-winning trailer, came “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo's” similarly stunning trailer. Beginning with a gate opening, the audience follows the snowy and desolate path towards the isolated Vanger estate. This journey is quickly intercut with a series of split-second moments from the movie. The entire thing is scored to the driving melody of Karen O.'s cover of “The Immigrant Song,” which suggests the Nordic setting and adds an intense burst of dreary power. The same song plays over the movie's expressionistic title sequence, where computer wires, faces, hands, flowers, and the titular tattoo form out of black tar, among images that suggest the themes of misogyny and fascism the film will explore. Both certainly make a hell of an impression. 

As an adaptation, Fincher's film sticks pretty closely to Larsson's source novel. The movie even chooses to keep the location as Sweden, even though everyone is speaking English. It keeps a lot of the material that was cut out of the Swedish film. (Or, at least, the shorter version I reviewed.) It includes the cat Mikael briefly adopts while on the island. He travels more, meeting an obscure cousin of Harriet's in London. The surveillance work Lisbeth does is maintained. The financial problems the magazine faces are covered, as is Henrik becoming its sponsor. Yet the film also simplifies the timeline of Larsson's story. Mikael doesn't have to serve jail time in the middle of the story. Only his credibility is destroyed by the lawsuit. There's fewer leads involved in the investigation, fewer names to remember. It's a faithful but pragmatic adaptation.

The biggest change Fincher's film makes to the source material is fixing Mikael Blomkvist. The literary Blomkvist, too often, came across as wish-fulfillment for Stieg Larsson. Here was a super-star journalist, who could bring down empires with just his words, whose magazine is so important that it often makes national news. He's also completely irresistible to women, embarking on at least two or three different affairs. (Aside from the regular hook-ups he has with his editor.) Also also, he has military training that saves his ass a few times. The Swedish films sought to fix this by making Blomkvist into a sad sack. The American movie goes the funnier route of making him kind of an idiot. Oh, he's a brilliant investigator but he survives the attempt on his life by blind luck. Later, he walks right into the killer's lair. He's still sleeping with some beautiful women but he's played by Daniel Craig, so that's pretty believable. 

Casting the role of Lisbeth Salander was a big deal. Every waif in Hollywood was up for the part but Fincher ultimately chose Rooney Mara, clearly impressed by her small role in “The Social Network.” Mara had big Dock Martins to fill, following Noomi Rapace's star-making take on the character. Mara's take on the character is less impulsive than Rapace's, whose vengeful furies are more premeditated than spontaneous. There's a colder quality to her, more alien-like in the way she regards the world. She doesn't let her vulnerability shine through nearly as much. Rapace was as if the character step right off the page. Rooney Mara's take is a different interpretation and a pretty good one. She's compelling and strong-willed.  

Inevitably, Mikael and Lisbeth fall into bed together in every version of the story. The novel and previous film had Salander do this as one of those decisions that nobody but her understood. Fincher's film has the two hook up right after he's nearly killed. The sex is seemingly a way for them to mutually unwind. From then on, every time they have sex, Lisbeth initiates it. She is in full control of her desires, of this relationship. Moreover, Mara and Craig have strong chemistry, his quirky humor bouncing off her ice cold exterior in a compelling way. It's the first time in any version of this story were you actually buy that these two are genuinely interested in each other. 

Sadly, if there's any way Fincher's “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” is less compelling than its Swedish sibling, it is the mystery itself. Hewing closer to the book in this regard, much of the investigation is devoted to people re-reading old documents. Both Mikael and Lisbeth spend a lot of time sorting through the archives, looking at ancient photographs over. Digging through the details meticulously, they forge a history of violence via dedicated research. And it's only so interesting to watch play out. The Swedish film focused on interviewing leads and looking at crime scenes, which was a little more cinematic than Lisbeth sitting in a library and looking at piles of old photos. 

My biggest qualm with the previous versions of “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” on both the page and the screen, was how it used women being sexually assaulted and murdered to prop up what was ultimately a pulpy murder-mystery. The 2011 “Girl” doesn't change the story. Lisbeth is still brutally raped by her legal guardian. She still uncovers a history of women being molested and murdered by depraved men. Fincher insures these reveals are as disturbing as possible. As the incident with Nils Bjurman begins, Fincher keeps showing a closing door and panning back, as if he's going to cut away. He doesn't. The resulting scene is incredibly disturbing and intense. If Fincher's film is going to cover these topics, he's going to make sure it's as horrible as possible.

Lisbeth's revenge on her rapist is as glorious as ever, paying evil unto evil in the most ironic way possible. Yet the film is aspiring to be a little more than a rape/revenge story. The remake focuses more on the connection between fascism and misogyny. The Vanger family history is littered with Nazis. Harriet's father and the eventual killer are revealed as serial predators that use women, kill them, and dispose of their corpses. One of them is a religious fanatic. Blomkvist's archenemy Wennerström is a rich criminal working to undermine the credibility of the free press. There is a definite link between these evils, the abuse of women operating as a part of authoritarian ideology. I wish the film made more of a point of this but it does the work.

Fincher, of course, works hard to elevate the material in other ways too. He directs the hell out of this movie. The frozen isolation of the northern setting is emphasized, the audience feeling the chill in the air. The urban scenes have the gritty, sickly grime that you've come to expect from this director. Nobody does this kind of thing better than Fincher. The surveillance footage of Lisbeth glaring into cameras, or the sweaty and sickly scenery as she takes her revenge, is so perfectly disquieting. The lair of the killer is shot in a sickly white, sterile and unnervingly so. The Swedish “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” had a hell of a climax, which the remake makes sure to maintain. The psycho killer's murder dungeon, the noose around the neck, the car chase and explosion are all shot and edited like gangbusters. Only an earlier fight scene on a subway is shakily shot and edited. I don't know what was up with that.

While this film is clearly a star vehicle for Craig and Mara, a very strong supporting cast is assembled as well. Robin Wright has a quiet sensuality and subtle intelligence as Blomkvist's business partner and regular girlfriend. Christopher Plummer could not be more perfectly cast as Henrik, an ancient patriarch. He approaches the long and controversial history of his family with a sardonic humor because it's the only way he can cope. Stellan Skarsgård is well cast as Martin Vanger, as he balances a charming side with a sinister undercurrent. Though the eventual reveal concerning that character is still a little too easy to guess.

Fincher's “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” maintains a lot of the problems of the source material. It's also too long, running five minutes more than the Swedish film, including the extended denouncement that puts every single plot thread to bed. This version does not feature a lot of belabored set-up for a sequel. Which turned out to be a good thing. “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” came out around Christmas of 2011 – the story is book-ended by the holiday – and sold itself as the “feel bad movie” of the holiday. Unsurprisingly, family audiences on Christmas vacation did not flock to a grim thriller full of graphic sexual assault and murder. While there was initial hopes that adaptations of “The Girl Who Played with Fire” and “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest” would follow, it was not to be. Both better and weaker than the Swedish original, it's still an involving film with some fantastic sequences built around an unforgettable leading lady. [Grade: B]

RECENT WATCHES: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (2009)

Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy became a global literary phenomenon by combining hot button real world political issues, with page-turner plotting and topping it off with an unforgettable goth girl protagonist. Of course, Larsson's untimely passing meant that the true master plan for his characters and their story would never exactly be told. Of his intended ten novels, “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest” is the last one Larsson would complete before his death. The film adaptation would follow in December of 2009, a mere three months after the film version of “The Girl Who Played with Fire.” (Making this one of the shortest gaps between sequels.)

After being shot in the head by her evil dad – and subsequently attempting to kill him with an axe – Lisbeth Salander is airlifted to a hospital. Her father, a defected Russian spy a secret sector of the Swedish government has promised to protect, is kept in the same hospital. After Zala threatens to reveal those secrets, he is killed by an elderly assassin who then turns the gun on himself. The Sector uses its resources to engineered a legal case against Lisbeth, to get her locked away forever and prevent the truth from ever coming out. Mikael Blomkvist and the staff of Millennium do everything they can to ensure Lisbeth's story is actually told. Meanwhile, Ronald Niedermann – Lisbeth's towering Neo-Nazi half-brother – still stalks the streets of Stockholm. 

The first two Millennium films told stories about the exploitation of women. Depending on your perspective, this was either an attempt to bring this important topic to light or a way to make pulpy thrillers seem more relevant than they actually were. While essentially still about that, especially after Lisbeth's rape by her legal guardian becomes a plot point here, “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest” is more squarely about government corruption... But not real world government corruption. The third in the series moves totally into the realm of conspiracy thriller, as a top secret sect of elderly agents are revealed to be behind all the woes in Lisbeth Salander's life. I guess it was inevitable that these stories would grow more outlandish as the series progressed.

All three of the Swedish Millennium films are breathlessly faithful to the source material, getting things down to a semi-manageable length by removing Larsson's more extraneous subplots. That was a big problem with “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.” The book rambled off on extensive digressions about the history of Cold War Sweden, intrigue at Millennium magazine, and Blomkvist getting a new hot bodybuilder girlfriend. All this shit is cut out of the movie and it improves things considerably. Erika Berger, Blomkvist's other girlfriend and editor at Millennium, being stalked and harassed is tied more concretely tied in with the main plot. Niedermann, who weaved in and out of the book at random intervals, is given more to do here, more concretely becoming the film's primary antagonist. 

This greatly improves upon a novel with a painfully slow pace, making for an overall punchier movie... But there's still a problem. See, Lisbeth herself is once again sidelined for most of “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.” This is an inevitable result of her recovering in a hospital from a wound that should've been fatal. After that, the film becomes a legal thriller, as the bad guys attempt to build up evidence that Lisbeth is delusional. The film does everything it can to make this set-up exciting. Watching Lisbeth tear through the holes in the prosecutor's story is pretty satisfying. There's also a sequence where Blomkvist and Berger are nearly machine gunned while at a restaurant. Yet there's only so much that can be done with a largely stationary story.

Once the legal proceedings are out of the way, “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest” can move towards an exciting finale. The confrontation between Lisbeth and Niedermann is an especially tense one. She's a rail thin, five foot tall punk rocker and he's a seven-foot tall Aryan psychopath who literally can not feel pain. (The producers originally wanted Dolph Lundgren for the part, incredibly on-the-nose casting that would've been Lundgren's first role in his native country in years. The more-than-capable Mikael Spreitz was cast instead.) Naturally, Lisbeth can outsmart her brawny opponent, a satisfying match-up to watch. Daniel Alfredson's direction has improved since the second film and this showdown looks nicely atmospheric.

After that compelling conclusion, "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest" abruptly ends. Presumably the author had a more complete ending in mind for Salander and Blomkvist some day. The terse passing of words and nods, something clearly unsaid between them, will have to do. More satisfying than the middle chapter, the final entry in the original Millennium trilogy still trails behind the first Lisbeth Salander adventure. No matter how fascinating Salander may be, perhaps she still worked best as simply a component in a larger pulp story. [6/10]

RECENT WATCHES: The Girl Who Played with Fire (2009)

Obviously, when the decision was made to adapt one part of Stieg Larsson's Millennium novels, the decision was made to adapt all of it. The three movies were clearly filmed back-to-back, the cast moving from one part to the next in quick succession. “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” was released in Sweden in February of 2009. “The Girl Who Played with Fire” would follow in September of the same year. Clearly, the producers of the trilogy were eager to capitalize on Lisbeth Salander fever while the iron was hot. While the initial entry in the series was popular with audiences and critics, opinion on the follow-ups are more divided.

Following her investigation into the Vanger family, super-hacker Lisbeth Salander retreats to the Caribbean with the millions she stole from a corrupt businessman. The death of her mother has her return to Sweden. At the same time, Mikael Blomkvist's Millennium Magazine is preparing a special issue all about sex trafficking. Several prominent men in the Swedish government are to be named as johns. That's before the writers of the article are murdered. Lisbeth is seemingly the perpetrator of the crime, though Blomkvist believes she's been framed. As he attempts to clear her name, he uncovers a mystery circling around a mysterious figure known as “Zala.” 

Though she got title billing in the English printing, Lisbeth Salander was just one of the protagonists in “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.” We can only speculate on his motivations now, but it seems to me that Larsson was probably aware of her status as the most interesting character in the book. He decided to focus the next two novels entirely around her origin story. Unfortunately, both the literary and cinematic “Girl Who Played with Fire” go about this in a pretty awkward manner. The majority of Lisbeth's personal history is explained in two scenes, where old guys expound on her past and parentage to Blomkvist. Exposition like this was heavy-handed on the page and is even more egregious on the screen.

There is another problem inherent in any version of “The Girl Who Played with Fire.” The first movie and book had a page-turning mystery at the center of its story, a decades-old disappearance and string of murders that couldn't help but draw the reader/viewer in. The sequel can not come up with an equally compelling mystery, attempting to center the plot around the question of “Who is Zala?” The answer to this question is a lot easier for the audience to guess and the investigation, which mostly revolves around simply talking to people, is not as involving. Much like the previous film, this story uses a string of raped and abused women merely as plot devices in a plot ultimately about something else entirely. (No matter how much the book and movie clearly want to be about exposing the dark truths around sex trafficking.)

For the second installment, director Niels Arden Oplev would trade off with Daniel Alfredson. Aside from being the brother of Tomas Alfredson, Daniel is probably best known for extensive work in Swedish television. This probably explains why “The Girl Who Played with Fire” feels so much like a TV movie. Granted, it's not necessarily a bad looking film. Alfredson makes sure to include lots of orange colors in many scenes, pointing towards the inferno referenced in the title. Yet the presentation here is largely pretty flat and plain. This is most apparent during the movie's fight scenes, which are clumsily framed and stiffly edited. The fisticuffs between a boxer and the movie's towering secondary villain are shot from weirdly distant angles and feature some extremely awkward slow-motion. 

A lot of the problems with “The Girl Who Played with Fire” are inherent in its plot. Long stretches of the story removes Lisbeth from the plot, focusing on side characters like her girlfriend or famous boxer Paolo Roberto. (A rare example of a notable figure appearing in a fictional book and then playing himself in the film adaptation.) Likewise, the entire story keeps Salander and Blomkvist apart from each other, removing their chemistry from the plot altogether. The movie only really comes to life when Lisbeth finally gets in on the action herself. When outsmarting a pair of bikers and, most notably, when finally confronting Zala herself. “The Girl Who Played with Fire” has a strong climax, where Lisbeth's indomitable will to survive has her crawl back to life from the brink of death and begin swinging an axe around.

Both Larsson's book and Alfredson's film adaptation function as the gawky middle chapter in a three part story. It even ends on a cliffhanger, feeling less like a complete story in its own right and more like the first half of one. Though the movie is something of an improvement over the book, as it clips out a number of extraneous subplots focused on the police detectives that enter the story and the characters' sex lives. Noomi Rapace is still a captivating heroine and Michael Nyqvist does a better job of making Mikael Blomkvist seem like less of a wiener. Yet “The Girl Who Played with Fire” can only be accepted as a middling sequel. [5/10]

RECENT WATCHES: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009)

Swedish journalist Stieg Larsson, known for his coverage of right-wing extremism and his socialist politics, died unexpectedly at the age of fifty in 2004. His friends and family say he barely slept and subsisted largely on coffee and fast food, which might explain his passing so young. Larsson left behind a trilogy of books, the first three parts of an intended decalogy, which were publish posthumously. Known as the Millennium Trilogy, the series became a best-seller in Sweden. When published in English, it became a world-wide success. Film adaptations would quickly follow, all three being released in 2009. “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” would debut on American theater screens shortly afterwards, which is when I first became hooked on Larsson's characters and story.

Journalist Mikael Blomkvist, head writer at the controversial Millennium magazine, has been convicted in a libel suit after writing an apparently fallacious expose on a millionaire named  Wennerström. Blomkvist insists on his innocence but prepares to face his sentence anyway. At this point, the head of the famous industrialist Vanger family hires Mikael. In 1966, Henrik Vanger's beloved niece disappeared, while the island was blocked off. Henrik is convinced she was murdered and that her killer is still alive. Blomkvist soon teams up with Lisbeth Salander, the mysterious and anti-social – but utterly brilliant – hacker that has been trailing him. Together, the two uncover a serial killer who has been active for decades. 

Stieg Larsson was not an especially great novelist but he knew how to put together a page-turner. “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” both the novel and the movie, present an irresistible mystery. Vanger repeatedly points out that nobody could've gotten in or off the island on that day. He's had forty years to endlessly rehash the evidence. We are presented with a worthy selection of scumbag suspects, all of them greedy industrialists or literal Nazis. It's a compelling scenario to start with. When Mikael does manage to uncover new evidence, via an old photograph, and has to track down a corresponding photograph from the same day, you are drawn in even more. Watching Mikael and Lisbeth dig through the clues and come out with a solution is a lot of fun. “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” in its literary form, was almost a textbook example of an airport read. The movie maintains that quality.

I mean, assuming you can stomach all the rape. The English translation of Larsson's original book title is “Men Who Hate Women.” Lisbeth is attacked by men in a subway, which is merely a predecessor to a more extreme abuse: Her legal guardian sexually assaults her in his office before brutally raping her on a later visit. This is depicted in graphic detail, the focus on her anguished face. Later, as Mikael and Lisbeth discover a serial killer is at work around the Vangers, they uncover photos of numerous dead girls. Their mutilated, usually nude corpses are shown on-screen. The film is obviously trying to make some sort of point about misogyny, about how men in power abuse women as easily as they breathe. Lisbeth's rapist and the sexist, anti-semantic serial killer both get what's coming to them. Yet whether you feel this justifies parading tortured, raped women around to spruce up a typical murder-mystery is really a matter of personal taste.  

What “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” has that really makes its special is a captivating protagonist. I'm not talking about Mikael Blomkvist. Michael Nyqvist plays Blomkvist as a bit of a sad sack. He's a good investigator, digging through piles of photos and seeking out decades-old witnesses. (This is an improvement over the book, where he's also irresistible to woman for some reason.) Yet he comes off as hopelessly dorky when compared to Lisbeth Salander. It's not her hacking abilities, which are basically magic, that make her so compelling. Lisbeth is a tiny girl with a troubled past, capable of being physically taken advantage of by anyone. Yet Lisbeth Salander doesn't give up. She gets even, usually in the most brutal way possible. She wails on a guy with a five-iron, in a key scene. And don't ask what she does to the man who assaulted her. Her practically monosyllabic personality also hides a secret pain, an intense vulnerability that she's afraid to show anyone even if it's always evident. In other words: She's exactly the kind of woman male readers become fascinated by. Noomi Rapace is a perfect match to the character Larsson wrote.  

Something else “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” has in its favor is a hell of a climax. The killer is uncovered when he captures Blomkvist and drags him down to his sterile torture chamber. It's a really exciting ending, that gets the suspense boiling and introduces a truly frightening villain. Niels Arden Oplev directs the hell out of it, with a big car crash and lots of dramatic moments. After that corker of a climax... The movie goes on for another half-hour. This is actually an improvement over the book's belabored denouncement, as the adaptation clips through the laundry list of subplots that needed wrapping up. (A longer television mini-series version of the film, put together in 2010, presumably re-instates many of these scenes and digressions.) Still, it really feels like a movie like this didn't need to be nearly three hours long, the same way the source novel didn't need to be eight hundred some pages.

Still, flaws and all, “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” became a lit-world phenomenon for a reason. It's a compelling mystery with a fantastically intriguing female lead. No wonder she got title billing in the English translation. (The dragon tattoo doesn't have much to do with it, despite the space it takes up on the marquee.) It's stylishly directed and has enough memorable sequences to make any extra investment worthwhile. As I said, whether you can tolerate dead and abused women being used as sacrificial plot points in a pulpy mystery will determine a lot of your opinion. I'm not really okay with that but I still think the positive outweighs the negative here. [7/10]

Director Report Card: David FIncher (2010)

9. The Social Network

It was probably around 2005 when a cousin of mine asked me if “my school had a Facebook yet.” I had no idea what he was talking about. Social media was not a new thing at the time, and I was already obsessed with the idea truthfully, but I had all my eggs in the MySpace basket. It would be years before I got onto Facebook. But get onto it I did and, just like everyone else, the site is now a daily part of my life. Yet the idea of turning the story behind Facebook into a movie, back in 2010, seemed a little desperate to me. Surely, the foundation of the site where we liked photos and poked people wouldn't be that cinematic. Not even David Fincher – who I had drifted away from a bit, by this point – directing piqued my interest too much.

That all changed the minute I saw the trailer for “The Social Network.” Functioning as much as a short film as an advertisement for the feature, those two minutes convinced me that, yeah, a movie about Facebook could be good. Within a few seconds, over a montage of photos and comments and status updates, the trailer convincingly portrays how Facebook has changed the ways we interact with each other. Set to a hauntingly beautiful choir cover of “Creep,” perfectly chosen clips from the film – along with that brilliant tagline – illustrate a story about longing to belong and a bitter entitlement to status. “The Social Network” is a very good film but its trailer is a masterpiece.

But let's talk about the actual movie now. In 2003, Harvard computer science major Mark Zuckerberg gets dumped by his girlfriend. As an act of revenge he creates FaceMash, a website where Harvard students can compare female students by “hotness.” The site is extremely popular and crashes several Harvard servers. This catches the attention of the Winklevoss twins, rowing athletes and the children of a rich lawyer. They hire Zuckerberg to make a social networking website but he decides to make his own instead. Hiring friend Eduardo Saverin as the site's business manager, Mark builds The Facebook. The site becomes a phenomenon and spreads across college campuses. Napster inventor Sean Parker becomes involved, encouraging Mark to take Facebook to even bigger places. Soon, the Winklevoss brothers sue Zuckerberg. Not long after that, Eduardo sues him too.

“The Social Network” makes a point that has been made many times before in history: Nothing motivates a man like sex. Or, rather, a bruised ego about sex. When Mark's girlfriend dumps him, because he was treating her like a robot, it wounds him. Facebook, essentially, is born from his masculine ego getting stabbed by her sharp, and honest, words. Mark feels entitled to a hot girlfriend. He feels entitled to entry into the exclusive clubs and frats he sees around him. He never suspects that his asshole demeanor is the reason he doesn't have these things already. When the success of Facebook gives him access to all the girls and money he could ever want, he's only convinced to double-down more on his bullish tactics. “The Social Network” is all about decidedly toxic, and distinctly masculine, nerd entitlement transforming a jerk into a monster.

“The Social Network” is also a story about an even older idea: Two close friends having a falling out. Eduardo and Mark are both nerdy Jewish kids. Saverin even writes out the coding formula that made that first website possible. They reap the initial success of Facebook together. Yet they are soon forced apart. Mark admires Sean Parker's rock star life style. Eduardo resents it, seeing Parker as an intrusion into the dynamic he has with Mark. As Mark pursues power over anything else, he betrays maybe the only real friend he's ever had. Watching the slow desolation of Mark and Eduardo's friendship feels tragic, men nearly as close as brothers forced apart by greed. Especially once you see Eduardo's growing cluelessness about how hard Mark is about to screw him. 

A number of factors distinguishes “The Social Network” as a David Fincher movie. However, one can make the argument that the movie really belongs to its screenwriter. Aaron Sorkin never lets you forget that he wrote the film. Every line of dialogue is super sharp and pointed. The characters speak in incredibly fast and frequently wordy burst. The scene where Mark describes, in voice-over, how he created FaceMash is a long stream of technobabble and witticisms. While Sorkin's work can be utterly smug and insufferable at times, it's kept in balance here. You can believe people would talk this way in the world of nerdy and rich college students and rising tech moguls. Fincher's instinct also sharpens Sorkin's dialogue, keeping the memorable sarcasm and ditching the self-righteousness.

In fact, “The Social Network” sometimes plays like a fantastically funny comedy about two dorks in way over their heads. Zuckerberg and his team of code monkeys are woefully unprepared for the fame and fortune that comes with Facebook's success. Mark tries to adopt to the wild frat boy lifestyle and ends up shattering a chimney and tossing a beer into the wall. The funniest scene in the film occurs when Mark is having a mini-breakdown on the phone while Eduardo's new girlfriend – a former groupie – sets his bed on fire. No wonder this story ends in betrayal. These two guys really stumbled into this, a point the movie makes repeatedly.

“The Social Network” would be a star-making turn for Jesse Eisenberg, who at the time was regarded as the poor man's Michael Cera but would quickly eclipse him. Eisenberg adapts an extremely precise and frequently curt way of speaking as Mark. He doesn't have much time for social niceties. Zuckerberg comes very close to being portrayed as a totally cold and calculating psychopath, especially as he focuses more on seizing power and control. Yet the humor Eisenberg – a perfect manifestation of Mark's ego – brings to the role makes him oddly charming. He also reveals enough of Zuckerberg's vulnerabilities to humanize him, even if he still comes off as a chilling villain protagonist.

If Zuckerberg is the cold center of “The Social Network,” the actors around him represent other extreme feelings. Andrew Garfield, as Eduardo, is almost playing a wide-eyed innocent. He is quickly overwhelmed by the pressure of Facebook's success and puts too much trust in his “friend.” It helps that Garfield is so boyish, like a puppy or something, that you really understand the guy when he eventually snaps at Zuckerberg. Justin Timberlake, as Sean Parker, functions as the devil on Mark's shoulder. He uses Mark to get revenge against old enemies, while tempting him with stories of more money and wild parties. The pop star is surprisingly good at making Parker seem somewhat unhinged and irresponsible but completely seductive at other times. 

Fincher, of course, directs the hell out of the movie. The dorms and meeting halls of Harvard are often overcast with a sickly green light and washed out visuals. This certainly makes the school seem a lot less hospitable than it could be, suggesting the sinister unease underneath. This also stands in contrast to the framing device, of Mark's various lawsuits, which are shot under almost sterile lighting. The movie is also incredibly tightly edited. The sequence where the Winklevoss twins row to a near-victory, set to “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” is thrillingly assembled. Fincher still knows how to put-together an action sequence like few other big Hollywood directors.

“The Social Network” would begin another important collaboration for Fincher. It's the first film of his to be scored by Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor. Considering Fincher's entire career sometimes feels like an audition to direct Nine Inch Nails music videos; he finally directed one in 2005; it's a fitting partnership. Reznor and Ross' score is surprisingly low-key. It's largely composed of quivering static, an unnerving layer of distortion floating under most of the movie's scenes. This adds an ominous quality to what is largely a drama composed of people talking, establishing the mood of betrayal and distrust that will soon follow. A immediately recognizable series of notes frequently rises above, which suggests the humble roots of the protagonist and how far they'll soon travel from them.

Watching “The Social Network” in 2021 is definitely a somewhat surreal experience. Kevin Spacey and Scott Rubin were both producers, their names in the credit leading to some “oofs” in a modern context. Of course, Arnie Hammer plays the Winklevoss twins, a rich sicko playing two rich conceited assholes. Moreover, the film was made before Mark Zuckerbery tried to make himself a presidential candidate. Before Facebook helped facilitate the undermining of the free press. Before it was used as a tool to distribute misinformation and discredit democracy. Before Zuckerberg had to stand before congress and admit all of this. Aaron Sorkin has expressed some interesting in writing a sequel, should David Fincher be interested in directing. Honestly, it's a pretty good idea. 

The real life people who inspired “The Social Network” insist it doesn't have much to do with reality. The sweaty, doe-eyed, milquetoast humanoid that testified in Washington certainly doesn't resemble the stone-cold master planner Jesse Eisenberg plays here. We can assume Zuck's real life media empire was less inspired by sexual frustration. Certainly none of this makes “The Social Network” any less of a compelling film. The way the movie examines the crossover between toxic masculinity and digital supremacy has only made it more relevant. The acting is great, the script is sharp, and the movie is compelling in its construction from beginning to end. [Grade: A-]