David Fincher Plugs Into The Social Network

For a while it was "Aaron Sorkin's Facebook Movie"-- the West Wing creator was taking the strange step of developing a movie about the Harvard students who created the ubiquitous website Facebook. And now we may start calling it "David Fincher's Facebook Movie." According to Variety, the Benjamin Button director is in advanced talks to direct the film, which is now titled The Social Network.

It should come as a relief to pretty much everyone to hear that the movie won't be about the site itself, but more about its origin story. Of course, given that there hasn't been a movie made about the invention of Apple, or Microsoft-- companies much older and with much more interesting back stories-- it's weird that Facebook is given this treatment to begin with. Is it even weirder that Fincher is involved? Not really. He's known for his obsession with using cutting edge technology to make his movies, so a movie about technology may be the only logical step forward. And while it's no longer safe to assume that everything Fincher touches will be probing and fascinating-- sorry, Button lovers, but that movie was pretty inert-- the guy definitely has an intellectual streak that could serve him well with this.

Does the world need a Facebook movie? God no. But if David Fincher and Aaron Sorkin are the ones bringing it to us, we might be able to deal with it regardless.