Rating: 4.5/5
Upon watching the trailer for the new Steve Jobs movie, I found a YouTube comment that read, “This movie is going to make the 2013 version with Ashton Kutcher look like a Lifetime Story.” And yes, it kind of does.
Directed by prolific UK director Danny Boyle, known for “Trainspotting” (1996), “Slumdog Millionaire” (2008), and “127 Hours” (2010), “Steve Jobs” delivers a very sobering, cold view of Jobs’ rise to immortality. The film tells Jobs’ story by highlighting three product launches, ending in 1998 with the reveal of the new iMac. Only hinting at Jobs’ dropping out of school to work in his garage on the computer with Steve Wozniak (covered in the 2013 version), this story of Jobs avoids exposition to focus on three moments that shaped his relationships with others most indelibly. Spanning from 1994 to 1998, “Steve Jobs” skips exposition to focus on a less examined aspect of Jobs’ success: his relationship with “collaborators.”
I say collaborators delicately because the movie very honestly exposes Jobs’ lack of appreciation for family, friends, and coworkers. The cast of this film is incredible. Michael Fassbender plays an incredibly cold Jobs, and Kate Winslet portrays an equally spellbinding Joanna Hoffman, a marketing executive and one of the only people brave enough to stand up to Jobs. The film also co-stars Seth Rogen (Steve Wozniak) and Jeff Daniels (John Sculley), creating an incredibly strong ensemble cast through which to judge Jobs’ icy demeanor.
The entire movie could be seen as a two-hour argument. Jobs demands complete darkness in the theater, illegally blacking out Exit signs. He asks Hoffman to find a white shirt from an audience member minutes before going on stage. He threatens Chief Developer Andy Hertzfeld with his job to make the computer say “hello” at the launch. You begin to wonder, why are people staying around? The film brilliantly uses these three product launches as the reason why people begin to leave. “Steve Jobs” examines the entrepreneur, but more poignantly examines the effect he has on others.
Like Jobs, the film rarely stops. Hoffman constantly fulfills Jobs’ demands, running to fetch his girlfriend Chrisann Brennan (Katherine Waterston) or wrangle up coworkers. She and Jobs’ daughter Lisa, become the movie’s strongest characters because they stand up to Jobs’ tyranny, and Boyle does well to slow down pacing to honor these moments. Undisturbed, honest communication with Jobs is very rare, and the film diagnoses his lack of compassion by contrasting his glorified, public presence with troubled, private tensions. Shots of the crowd cheering in anticipation alternate with an argument with Brennan about not paying for her medical bills. Hoffman, and Hertzfeld, often overhear personal conversations through Jobs’ office door. Boyle separate Jobs’ public, glorified appearance and messy, private life very effectively, making the film feel (very satisfyingly) like we are also hearing conversations we aren’t supposed to hear.
In addition to a sense of voyeuristic excitement, the film’s blending of flashbacks with real time conversations inform Jobs’ rocky work-relations history. During one visit with Sculley, the movie intercuts dialogue of Jobs and Wozniak in their garage with the real-time argument, informing the backstory to Jobs’ and Sculley’s declining relationship. This editing also exposes Jobs’ manipulation of others, flashing back to moments of seemingly genuine collaboration to contrast Jobs’ current egotism. Morphing time makes it clear these tensions have lasted for years, giving weight to losing relationships in his life. This editing style is a bit jarring, but portrays Jobs’ manipulations effectively.
While still focused on his career, “Steve Jobs” truly succeeds in ripping the cover off Jobs’ struggle with interpersonal relationships. Boyle literally gives the viewer backstage access to Jobs and his team, resulting in a satisfying, troubling view of one of the world’s most innovative people. The film may feel messy and fast-paced, but its editing and cinematography serve Jobs’ story well, framing his life as full of frenetic, contradictory excitement. Certainly, the film accepts Jobs as an innovator; yet, Boyle really questions the nature of genius, and whether being one is as important as how you become one.
Catch “Steve Jobs” at Kimball’s at 5 p.m. and 7:35 p.m. for student prices Tuesday, as well as at Tinseltown at various times. Check back next week for Emily Blunt in the FBI drug thriller “Sicario.”
Thomas Crandall
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