In 2011, they made a movie about Facebook. “The Social Network” became one of the most acclaimed films of the year, grossed $225 million, was nominated for eight Academy Awards including Best Picture, and won three, including Best Adapted Screenplay and giving Aaron Sorkin (“The West Wing,” “A Few Good Men”) his first and at this time only Oscar win. The film’s esteem has only grown in the years since, now becoming one of the most beloved films of the 2010s. Given everything that’s happened with the social media/tech juggernaut in the following years, it only makes sense that Sorkin, now directing as well as writing, would want to take another swing at Zuckerberg and his website. Hence “The Social Reckoning,” a semi-sequel/follow-up that seeks to reexamine Facebook’s place in our lives and judicial system since the 2011 hit.
Set in 2019, the film follows Facebook data engineer Frances Haugen, played by Mikey Madison (“Anora,” “Scream (2022)”), who approaches Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz, played by Jeremy Allen White (“The Bear,” “The Iron Claw”), to help her break the story that Facebook was aware of harmful societal effects from its platforms, and chose to prioritize their profit over addressing them. Meanwhile in 2021, Mark Zuckerberg, played by Jeremy Strong (“Succession,” “The Trial of the Chicago 7”), butts heads with his crisis management specialist Raya, played by Wunmi Mosaku (“Sinners,” “Loki”), and a former investor and member of his legal counsel Charlie Garrigan, played by Bill Burr (“The King of Staten Island,” “F is for Family”), over how to handle testifying before the U.S. Senate on Facebook’s effects on the world.
It’s not hard to see why Sorkin would want to return to this well. Not only is the original film likely his most well-known and acclaimed work, but since its release, he’s pivoted mostly to making films about true events, instead of fabricated ones. His writing comes across as far more forced than ever before though. Sure, it still has his trademark rapid fire dialogue and pop culture jabs. But things feel more transparently performative this time. Sorkin has clearly always been a nerd at heart, but this film is truly written like he’s trying to get back at someone, rather than present a genuinely compelling scenario. While Sorkin has also had issues with writing women in the past, numerous scenes here also stand out as being bizarrely sexist. Worst of all, these lines and moments serve no purpose in the actual narrative, instead existing for... seemingly just no reason. Somehow, despite the script's weak elements, the film doesn’t drag, pacing itself well enough to get through its two hour length without much downtime.
Madison and White are good here, doing a lot with a weak script. Madison is clearly the film’s stand out, and each moment she spends on screen is injected with little moments that build Frances out as an unlikely heroine. She’s a compelling character, and while the script may falter, Madison’s performance never does. White is less successful mostly because the character is less interesting, but he’s still good in the role. He’s the film’s moral center and spends much of his time standing around as Madison explains technical terms and algorithms to him. It’s not a bad role, but it's almost cartoonish in how cliched it feels. Strong is the most fun to watch mostly because he’s the one doing the most acting in teh whole film. His voice and mannerisms for Zuckerberg may or may not be accurate, but he’s always the most interesting person on screen when he appears. Burr is an unexpected highlight, as he drops in like an acidic guardian angel to lecture Zuckerberg in some of the film’s better dialogue, and Mosaku is good but painfully underutilized by the film’s end.
The film has a painfully flat and grey look to everything, sapping much of the events of any sense of distinction or color. Cinematographer Jeff Cronenweth (“Gone Girl,” “Fight Club”) returns from the previous film, and he does the best he can with Sorkin’s direction, but it's a very static movie. So many scenes take place inside buildings and offices where only important characters exist. A few scenes outdoors in Puerto Rico with background cast not only come alive in terms of color, but in terms of warmth and liveliness. A movie inherently being cold isn’t a bad thing; the bad thing is that this coldness feels like a byproduct rather than anything intentional. Alexandre Desplat’s (“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” “Fantastic Mr. Fox”) score can’t hold a candle to Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’s work on the first film, but it stands on its own as a good mixture of warm human instruments and electronica beats.
It’s obvious that Sorkin wants this film to be in the vein of movies like “All the President’s Men,” but he’s failed to capture any sense of warmth or humanity that those films have. Instead, things are routinely scenes of people explaining statistics to other people, having the dramatic tension hinge on percentages and numbers. That’s not a bad way to make a film, and there are plenty of examples of excellent movies built around those ideas. The problem is Sorkin’s direction leaves everyone feeling more like standees made to recite numbers rather than people. It just feels like a film where all of its worst aspects are due to Sorkin’s control, like everyone was afraid of the prospect of telling him no. It’s a film with too much scope and yet not enough going on, and the third act climax builds to a real-life event that is quite baffling to have in a mainstream Hollywood film like this.
On paper, everything about this film makes sense. Sure, the original actor for Zuckerberg declined to return, as did the original film’s director, but those are minor bumps in the road. Well, apparently not, as the resulting film ends up being far blander than it should. Even at his worst, Sorkin manages to be somewhat inflammatory. Here, it’s as if he wants to make a film for everyone... about politics and social media and the divide they’ve created. The musical score is good, it’s paced well enough, and the actors are clearly talented and doing the best they can with what they’re given. But when all a film like this, that clearly wants to say something and be important, can muster is a blasé feeling of indifference, something has gone truly wrong. 2/5
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