Throwback to 2004! Will you friend me on Facebook?

David Fincher’s, “The Social Network,” starring Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield, Justin Timberlake, and Armie Hammer (times two), takes moviegoers inside the close-knit circle that brought the popular social networking app, Facebook, to life. While they did bring Facebook to life, it is widely debated if the creative idea behind it was truly theirs or not.

The film follows Harvard University sophomore and co-founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg (Eisenberg), as he struggles with college heartbreak, friendly scandals, and handling lawsuits regarding his social networking site, Facebook.

After being approached by fellow Harvard students, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss (Hammer), for his tremendous efforts when hacking into the university’s database creating a campus website where students were able to rate female students’ attractiveness, Zuckerberg was offered to work with them and fellow business partner, Divya Narendra, to create a social networking platform strictly for Harvard students titled The Harvard Connection.

Not only did Zuckerberg accept their offer, but he ultimately transformed their idea into something more extravagant; something that would reach even more people.

Leaving the Winklevoss twins and their business partner in the dust, Zuckerberg gains his own team, a team including some that have been with him from the beginning, and some that are in it for the long run. Zuckerberg asks his close friend, Eduardo Saverin (Garfield), to be his right-hand man, business partner, and co-founder for the entirety of Facebook’s life. Saverin places a $1,000 investment in Facebook so that Zuckerberg can work to expand and improve Facebook’s platform.

In the process of expanding their site, Facebook’s co-founders meet with Sean Parker (Timberlake), an online music streaming service Napster co-founder, as they navigate how to make money from their site. Parker impresses Zuckerberg with his immense knowledge of the business world and asks him to join his team in developing the most popular social networking site to date.

Shortly after asking Parker to join their team, Saverin is left in the dust. It’s been disclosed that Parker and Saverin had differing opinions when it came to the business of Facebook, however, this difference in opinion, among other things, led to Saverin’s Facebook shares being diluted from 34% to .03% while everyone else’s shares were left alone. His name was also removed from Facebook’s masthead, no longer stating that he was a co-founder of the site. Was this because Saverin’s priorities lied elsewhere? Was it because he was being replaced? Or was it because of something trivial that happened in college?

While Zuckerberg seemed to steamroll through the treacherous terrain with a handful of enemies on either side of it, both the Winklevoss twins and Saverin did not go down without a fight. Spoiler alert!

Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss ended up suing Zuckerberg for theft of intellectual property, in other words, for stealing their idea. They acquired a 65-million-dollar settlement and signed a non-disclosure agreement after doing so. Eduardo Saverin received an unknown settlement, and his name was restored to the Facebook masthead, restating that he was, and still is, a co-founder of Facebook.

While this film is based on true events, it is just that, a film. Some scenes were able to nail the historical accuracy right on the head, while others failed to do that, for entertainment purposes. Screenplay writers and directors of the film want to make sure that audiences are able to distinguish between the two: reality and film.

As of last year, 2020, Facebook is valued at 720 billion dollars. Facebook currently has 2.80 billion members in a total of 207 countries. Are you one of them?

“The Social Network” is rated PG-13 for sexual content, drug and alcohol use, and foul language. It has scored a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes and won three Oscars at the 83rd Academy Awards in 2011: Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score, and Best Film Editing. This film is available for viewing on Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube, and Vudu.

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Avery Heverly is a staff reporter for The Express.

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