The Social Network

According to director David Fincher’s latest masterpiece, the creation of Facebook was fraught with betrayal and backstabbing—and may not have happened had creator Mark Zuckerberg not gotten dumped. Jesse Eisenberg gives a hypnotic performance as Zuckerberg, portraying him as a geek who gets in over his head and must learn to stomp on his friends to achieve success. One of those friends was Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin, played by Andrew Garfield (the future Spider-Man). Eisenberg and Garfield set the screen on fire when things go bad between their characters. Justin Timberlake is equally effective as Napster co-founder Sean Parker, who offered a little advice and then saw himself near the top of the Facebook hierarchy. The film contains one of the best visual effects Fincher has ever put to film, and it’s so good I didn’t notice it: While Armie Hammer’s face and voice play both Winklevoss twins, Josh Pence’s body was used for the portrayal of Tyler. Hammer’s face was then added to Pence’s body to create the illusion of identical twins. It’s incredible.