The Aaron Sorkin movie slightly about Steve Jobs

Cafe Society
1

I really dug it.

As with all Sorkin media, the film primarily consists of people talking in rooms. The structure for this one was interesting: Steve faces various personal crises in the minutes before three important product launches: The Mac 128 in 1984, the NeXT cube in 1988, and the iMac in 1998. No mention is made of Steve’s involvement in Pixar.

Steve Wozniak (who consulted with Sorkin a little) has said the movie does a great job of capturing the characters of Steve Jobs and the people around him, but of course the whole thing is executed in Sorkin’s trademark breathless, larger-than-life manner. As a character drama it’s marvelous; as history it’s about as good as The Social Network (i.e. not that great.) I am glad somebody was finally fair to John Sculley (played by [del]Dumber[/del] Jeff Daniels) who acts as an excellent foil/father figure to Jobs. Kate Winslet did a marvelous job as Joanna Hoffman as well. Seth Rogen as Woz seemed slightly non-stoned and just as hairy as usual.

2

It’s in very limited release in the US, which is why you haven’t gotten any feedback. It opens in a few theaters here in Chicago on Friday.

3

Yeah, I frequently forget that I often get to see movies ahead of time because we New Yorkers are better than everyone.

4

I thought Sorkin’s signature was people talking while walking hurriedly down a hallway? The casts of his shows called it a “walk and talk”, but more formally, it’s called a “pedeconference”.

The More You Know…

5

Might be good. My only quibble is that, according to the trailer, they cribbed a joke from the musical 1776.

“You had three weeks–the universe was created in less time!”
“Well, someday you’ll have to let us know how you did it.”

Versus:

Adams: Good God! A whole week! The earth was created in a week!
Jefferson: And someday you must tell me how you did it.

6

What do you think they’re using the hallway for? To go to a room.

7

laugh As someone who loves New York, I wouldn’t fight about it, but our rents are lower.

I’ll be seeing Steve Jobs on Tuesday. I wish I’d seen the Alex Gibney documentary, but it came and went too soon and I missed it.

8

I saw it today, and thought it was absolutely brilliant. I don’t know if it was accurate as history, but as a movie it was pitch perfect. To me, it didn’t feel like watching a movie at all, it felt like being backstage and overhearing those conversations. I predict that Kate Winslet will be nominated for an Oscar. Can’t say yet if she’ll win, because there are too many performance still to be seen, but that was truly an acting tour-de-force.

It’s interesting that I enjoyed it as much as I did, because I found The Social Network muddled and boring.

9

I really enjoyed it–not as personal history (who knows how real that is)–but as a character study of a man who’s equally troubled, brilliant, and insufferable. Fassbender really captures his brusque, visionary nature and while the structure is very theatrical, Danny Boyle gets a ton of mileage from (essentially) 3 settings–2 of which are San Francisco landmarks where I’ve spend many hours but rarely get any screen time, so that was a nice bonus.

Incredibly literate, very well-acted, and quite compelling.