Aaron Sorkin, creator of “The West Wing” and screenwriter of “The Social Network,” appears to be a PC man.
“Steve Jobs,” Sorkin’s latest project, depicts the Apple co-founder as more selfish than ingenious, as it focuses on personal failings and his egocentric reign over the company.
However, the biting portrayal is also pretty brilliant. Michael Fassbender, who plays Jobs, riffs perfectly with Kate Winslet, who portrays Joanna Hoffman, the marketing executive for the Macintosh and Jobs’ right-hand woman.
The biopic also stars the talented Seth Rogen, who portrays Steve Wozniak, the slighted co-founder of Apple. Where Hoffman coaxes Jobs to be a better leader, father and business partner, Wozniak berates him for those same flaws.
“You can’t write code, you’re not an engineer, you’re not a designer, you can’t put a hammer to a nail,” Wozniak said at one point in the film. “So how come 10 times in a day I read, ‘Steve Jobs is a genius’? What do you do?”
The film follows a three-act structure. Each centers on the moments before a major stockholders’ meeting: the launch of the original Macintosh in 1984, the introduction of the Black Cube at NeXT, the company Jobs started after being forced out of Apple in 1988 and the debut of the iMac after Jobs returned to Apple in 1998.
Sorkin expects his audience to be familiar with the Steve Jobs success story going into the film, so he glosses over facts with a heavy coat of drama. Every major conflict in Jobs’ life, personally and professionally, seems to come to a head in these three moments before he changes the world.
The lack of exposition means that the audience gets to jump straight into the drama. Tensions are high and conflicts mount. Fassbender portrays one of America’s most beloved businessmen when he is at his worst.
Sorkin’s beautifully written dialogue is delivered with precision and passion, all at once. The film is dark and cutting and forces the audience to question why we all worship our laptops and, by extension, the man who dreamed them up.
Rogen’s Wozniak reminds us that brilliance isn’t an excuse for malice. “It’s not binary,” he said. “You can be decent and gifted at the same time.”
