Is “The Social Network” (the story of the founding of “Facebook”) all that? Yes it is. What’s the hook? I think there are four: 1) Facebook has changed the face of the Internet and the world. It’s just too big to ignore. 2) Like “The Revenge of the Nerds,” “The Social Network” chronicles the shift of power to the “geeks,” who are not only off-the-charts brilliant, but understand the potential of technology. 3) Like Bill Gates, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg seems to be a shrewd and ruthless young businessman who, for all his own social awkwardness, really does understand human nature. This understanding just doesn’t seem to work for him personally. 4) Understanding how people use today’s and tomorrow’s technology is “the next big thing.” Those who cling to outmoded ways of thinking about technology will be thrown on the radiation-exuding landfills of history. The future is always about new ideas, not stasis, and the young Turks will supersede not only the old Turks, but one another in winner-take-all battles. Zuckerberg has been thoroughly skewered in this movie. How much is true? Clearly the legal proceedings against Zuckerberg did not come out in his favor. Or maybe they did (since they were out-of-court settlements that a character tells Zuckerberg is like “paying for a parking ticket”). Zuckerberg is made to look like an ambitious, self-obsessed, controlling, scheming, misanthropic, arrogant, jealous person. And what’s worse, a doublecrossing friend. But not greedy, not really. For him, money is only power, it’s only the symbol of a superior being. In the movie, Zuckerberg also finds himself to be superior due to his computer prowess, and says as much. Spolier alert: But at the end, when he’s sitting on top of the world quite literally, Zuckerberg is left without the one thing he wanted most, or at least wanted as much as sitting on top of the world: Erica. What a perfect closing shot: Zuckerberg using Facebook to slowly send a friend request to her. There is little hope it will be confirmed, but he keeps hitting “refresh” over and over, waiting. Love is the one thing that the masters and commanders of the world can’t master and command, can’t outsmart everyone else to obtain. One has to put self to the side, die to self to even really see the other person, the beloved, as “other,” not just an extension of self. One wonders if the silver-screen Zuckerberg could ever let go of self enough to develop this capacity.