The Circle

A good movie with amazing performances by some great Actors like Emma Watson and Tom Hanks and the late Bill Paxton...this could so easily happen with technology these days.....

Great movie. Felt like a combination of "Black Mirror" and "1984"

Epic movie. Great message. Emma is brilliant.

The premise of the movie is great. I'm watching this for the first time, in the year 2020. Since 2017 (the year this movie was released) there's increasing concern about the overreach these so called, "social media" companies have over people's lives, and the democratic process in general.

Although the ideal would be to regulate these companies, I also like the other extreme this movie's protagonist took. Let's make it mandatory for the Founders/CEOs and Executives of these companies to share all their personal information in the very platform they use to harvest personal information from their fellow citizens for profit. That way, the tax payers won't have to foot the bill of regulating this new tobacco industry of the 21st century.

Lots of talented actors, nice visuals, brilliant concepts. However, I think the best phrase for this movie is "Wait, what storyline?".

6.5/10

I've just finished watching this movie in the cinema (3 hours before this comment).
I liked the movie mainly because[spoiler] of the ethical issues that it raises around its theme (despite some things are unfortunately already happening nowadays).[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Emma and Hanks played very well their roles but, for example, Hanks' character Eamon Bailey wasn't that Forrest Gump which allowed Hanks to show us what he does best.
The character Ty could have been so much more explored too...[/spoiler]

[spoiler]So, in the end, I felt like the movie was too short... not in time, but in exploring such a powerful and important ethical topic about the present and future of full social interaction or "transparency" as they called.
I think this movie should have at least one sequel showing what could happen after the end scene, now that everybody is "transparent", for example.
If it has a sequel I'll be sure to come back here and give it an 8 instead of a 7.
It may seem too high of a rate for some people, and if it wasn't for Emma Watson and Tom Hanks I wouldn't probably be so impatient to go watch it in the day after the release date, but as I said... [/spoiler]I loved the theme!

I definitely recommend you to watch The Circle, but don't go too critic about it. Just enjoy it[spoiler] and think "what if it was my turn to be transparent?"... when it comes to us it's always different and that's the point the movie does explore well![/spoiler]

Cheers!

there are things that I like about this movie and some that I somewhat don't understand.

I like the concept that it want to express : sure, technology everywhere and always can be useful in may ways, but we also need to keep our bundaries and not get overwhelmed by it. I love the general theme of everyone always being so exited about all the new stuff while the viewer clearly has a creepy feeling about it. there was this clear cut between me and the people in the movie, Everytime they were so happy about something I was thinking to myself "ok I can see why that would be good but it's too much".

I also really liked the protagonist, she seemed like a normal person that understands all the implications that these things have (like us) but instead she gets dragged deeper and deeper into the complete tech-absorption. I was 100% sure that when she made the bosses transparent they would find all the filth, close down the circle and the movie would end in this tech free world or something like that but no. I was really surprised to see that instead of getting rid of all of this she uses that as an escamotage to really fully expand it EVERYWHERE. Complete annihilation of privacy. A really interesting concept.

On the other hand I kind of did not understand some sequences of the movie. I cannot comprehend how easily it was for her to access the big databases, I don't really understand if the founder was running away and hiding from the company or if they knew where he was all the time. Some dynamics really feel just offsetting and make you kind of uncomfortable, but I guess that is the general purpose of the movie, to show that, if really exasperated, technology can be dangerous.

Overall, a nice movie, not mind-blowing or anything, but a cool watch nonetheless

This film has lots of many interesting applications of our beloved technology, as farfetched as they seem, some of this technology isn't far off existing, if it doesn't already. However, the cult following and pyschopathic desire to own every bit of data about everything really adds a whole level of creepy and (hopefully) fiction to this situation.

It's a well thought out story with the correct amount of character development in most cases, I didn't think Hermione was working in the tech industry.

The ending was a rollercoaster, the exhilaration of Mae's braveness and the sheer look of defeat in the leaders' eyes' was looking to end the film on a high, then, it ended. There was nothing said of what became of Bailey and Stenton, or of the company.

The somewhat disappointing ending doesn't take away from the film, I enjoyed it and would recommend it to others.

30/03/2019
7/10

'The circle' aims high, manages to perform well until about halfway, then it crashes in a rather lackluster and unresolved ending.

I did not know much about this movie before going in, except for it having a stellar cast with Tom Hanks, Emma Watson, Karen Gillan (someone I always like seeing), Bill Paxton and Patton Oswalt. After watching the movie I was very surprised by discovering the utter trash reviews it got from both critics and fans. I can see its flaws, but I do not agree this amount of low-balling is something the movie deserves in my humble opinion.

Warning: Light spoilers ahead. (Heavy spoilers are hidden.)

Let's start at the beginning; Mae (played by Emma Watson) is a 20-something girl living somewhere in the near future in the San Fransisco area. She has a dead-end job at a customer service company, and she isn't happy. Her life goes nowhere, and she feels bad for not being able to help her dad, who suffers from MS. The story kick starts when her friend sets her up for an interview with a high-profile tech company. From this point onwards things start to snowball, and Mae gets [spoiler]pulled deeper and deeper into her work until she becomes like a social media, pop star-like, mascot for the company. [/spoiler]

Story
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'The circle' follows a conventional third person storytelling with 3 tightly structured acts. It is based on the book with the same name written by Dave Eggers. The story revolves around a fictional company called 'The circle' which is an obvious possible future mirror of Apple, but can also represent Google, Facebook, Samsung, Amazon or other tech giants we know today. The main dilemma is about the discussion of privacy vs. transparency, a question notably relevant in today's world concerning tech companies and public surveillance. It also touches upon the value of friendship, family, self confidence and a late coming-of-age story of a 20-something year old.

The initial set up is done well, but nothing special. We get introduced to the main character her life; her family, most important friends, her first days at 'the circle' and its community. The first signs of trouble arrive when Mae is confronted [spoiler]by not having set up her social media profile at the company after a week of being there.[/spoiler] After this the stakes slowly get higher and higher, something that is subtly (but a bit too obviously) paced. The most intriguing thing that the movie does is taking that initial dilemma, and move the line that needs to be crossed slightly further every time. It reminded me a bit of the 1981 film 'The Wave' which was based on a real life experiment by a teacher in Germany. A teacher showed the dangers of populism and fascism by slowly setting a more extreme boundary, so he avoided a 'shock effect' and the people (students) kept following him. The difference is that the jumps are sometimes a bit too big in 'The Circle'. It looks like the movie wants to make you think about the questions it asks its characters more than giving an in-world experience. My guess is that this is why the movie bombed with both critics and audience.

This also goes for the ending; when Mae [spoiler]turns the tables on the bosses of the company (played by Tom Hanks and Patton Oswalt) it is unclear if she wants to continue the direction the company is heading in and even widen it, or is actually out on stopping it but knows it is already too late and the end result will be inevitable at this point.[/spoiler] Again I think the movie rather wants to hold up a mirror to our current society and not make a finished product with all the answers. Even though I sympathise with this, it is not executed well enough and the ending might be either too ambiguous or not ambiguous enough with [spoiler]Mae sitting in her kajak surrounded by drones. Could this be a result from her choice? Or was it an inevitable thing? [/spoiler]


Characters
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The actors portraying the main characters are performing ok overall. Nobody really gave a bad performance, but there were no little moments where they actually shine either. The chemistry between characters was lacking sometimes because of clunky dialogue, [spoiler]most notably the chemistry between Mae (Emma Watson) and Annie (Karen Gillan) was rather lacking, and it made the toilet scene rather dull. Also the public fight between Mae and Mercer (Ellar Coltrane) was a bit cringy and lacked common sense.[/spoiler] The best scenes were in the beginning of the movie, with Mae seeing her dad (played by Bill Paxton) having problems and Mae being thankful for Annie helping her and her parents. The characters and performances shined best on itself, with Karen Gillan being the highlight in the non-verbal acting.

Visuals & Music
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The movie has a comforting use of lightning, and there are some beautiful set pieces and location shots and/or photography. It sets a consistent colour palet and tone for its settings, which is usually agreeing with a positive Silicon valley kind of mentality. This contrasts the dark undertone the movie has, and to me that was something I really enjoyed. It mimics reality where the positivity of technology often outshines (or simply ignores) the risks. Also the implementation of the technology was rather seamless. It was obviously there, but it was never too surreal or too much. Music was rather minimalistic and fitting, but except for a handful of scenes never more than just some complimentary background music.

Overall
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Even though this movie has many flaws, I enjoyed watching it thoroughly. It hinges between a documentary of social decay and a satire comedy drama. Even though it fails to be any of those perfectly, it does well as a society commentary and only drops the ball in being a bit too obvious and never delivering on it's hinted solution.

I was very intrigued by one of the comments Mae received, which stated "No one at the circle has kids." This insinuated that the circle has no future, and even though the questions this movie asks are relevant, I doubt this movie will stay relevant for very long considering its bad reception.

This is another one that I remember vividly when it was coming out. The concept was awesome, the cast was great, the execution left me wanting. Almost a decade later, I share much of the same sentiment. The premise really carries this film, but it is interesting to see the advancement of technology since then. Everyone has doorbell cameras tracking anything and everything on your property, our phones share all of our data all the time with anyone in the world, and ultimately technology is kind of scary. This movie makes you think quite a bit, even if the movie aspect is okay at best.

Rating: 2.5/5 - 70% - Worth Watching