Judging by Aaron Sorkin's The Social Reckoning, few the world's ill can't be linked to Facebook. An overstatement on my part to be sure, but Reckoning scowls at Facebook for abetting dangerous political extremism, wrecking young lives with cyberbullying, and allowing Jan. 6 rioters to post about their assault on the Capitol.
Social Reckoning isn’t entirely wrong in its assertions, but Sorkin, working from his own screenplay, has drained much of the suspense from a story built around two characters, a Wall Street Journal reporter (Jeremy Allen White) and a Facebook whistleblower (Mikey Madison).
Madison’s Frances Haugen began as a true-believing coding engineer intent on saving Facebook from abandoning its professed desire to become the world’s town square.
By the time the movie opens, Facebook already has attained trillion-dollar status, and Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg (Jeremy Strong) has become an autocratic sphinx mired in capitalist tunnel vision.
Much of the movie follows the guidelines of a journalistic procedural as White’s Jeff Horwitz, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting, tries to get the goods on Facebook.
Madison’s Haugen holds the key to Horwitz’s success; Haugen has access to important computer files, but she’s wary of breaking the law by giving them to Horwitz. She initially alerts Horwitz to the story, expecting that his investigative skills will be sufficient to obtain the needed evidence.
Sorkin has a knack for depicting work-place vibes. The supporting cast rounds out Facebook’s headquarters. Billy Magnussen portrays the smiling head of PR. Bill Burr plays a hard-boiled former employee, now a consultant who tries to steer Zuckerberg toward social responsibility. Betty Gilpin signs on as Horwitz’s brusque boss.
The main events, which take place between 2019 and 2021, are undergirded by scenes devoted to a rehearsal in which a crisis manager (Wunmi Mosaku) tries to humanize Zuckerberg for a pending Congressional hearing, no easy task with a man whose deadpan expression never seems to have been interrupted by anything as foreign as a smile.
The story culminates with a Congressional hearing at which Hougen testifies, leaving us to assume that the problems the movie raises are the bedrock on which Sorkin has built an old-fashioned expose.
Facebook, the movie contends could have been more responsible, but it would have come with a cost. If the company had refused to post obviously false or inflammatory content, it would have had to accept a one percent loss in profits, one exec says. Zuckerberg declined.
As is the case with many Sorkin efforts, Reckoning bolsters a talky screenplay that brims with the kind of clever repartee that distinguishes the Sorkin brand, but here can feel a bit formulaic.
White plays Horwtiz as a good guy and persistent reporter. Madison ably depicts a young woman who’s wrestling with her conscience, but, by the end, it’s difficult to feel as if the movie has reckoned with anything more than a point of view that’s clearly established at the outset.
Enough of this. I needn’t tell you that Facebook, now Meta, still operates as do the company’s other businesses, which include Instagram, Messenger, and What’sApp.
As for Zuckerberg, he was one of the tech honchos who late last month was summoned to the White House to discuss AI … er … I mean Super Intelligence. It all makes you wonder whether any movie involving tech ethics can avoid feeling like yesterday’s news.
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