Spoilers
The Circle is a cautionary tale about tech companies and the ever blurring meaning of privacy.
Seen from the point of view of its millennial protagonist, Mae Holland (Emma Watson) like many of her generation is just starting her life in the workforce, feeling a little lost, worrying of making an impact. Which all changed after getting a job in the Circle, the most powerful tech company in the world.
To have great pay and some freebies; to always be on the front seats of creating something new that could change the world was living the dream until Mae's old world and her new, clashed.
Overall the movie manages to hang on a knife edge between contemporary and thus relatable and being outrageously sci-fi or a mind-fuck like Black Mirror. It may have balanced itself too well in that it didn’t cut a lasting impression.
Bad Chemistry, Bad Lead
Back in the day, I accepted Hermione Granger without reservation. She's Harry Potter's friend, so what else is there to look for? I believed in the Hermione and Harry partnership than what they ended up with in the end of the series. I was sold.
Now even if Emma, who played Hermione, has grown into a beautiful young woman that I would love to date, I cannot say with as much certainty if I want her to lead a movie.
Now even if Emma, who played Hermione, has grown into a beautiful young woman that I would love to date, I cannot say with as much certainty if I want her to lead a movie.
She doesn’t mix
well with many characters including what should have been the most crucial relationships to Mae Holland's arc
in Annie (Karen Gillan) and Mercer (Ellar Coltrane). The downward spiral of one relationship signals trouble in the Circle, and the loss of the other signaled a confrontation to come.
When trouble did come to the friendship I didn't feel anything because they looked so dead. It literally took me the second watching to have a vaguest idea that one could be the best friend and the second a potential lover.
via GIPHY
And I didn't get the idea because Annie or Mercer were so convincing partnered with Mae - quite the opposite - to suggest any kind of long standing relationship and closeness. I got the idea because both had pictures with Mae stretching back years.
When trouble did come to the friendship I didn't feel anything because they looked so dead. It literally took me the second watching to have a vaguest idea that one could be the best friend and the second a potential lover.
And I didn't get the idea because Annie or Mercer were so convincing partnered with Mae - quite the opposite - to suggest any kind of long standing relationship and closeness. I got the idea because both had pictures with Mae stretching back years.
The bigger load was on Mercer but his chemistry with Mae is deader than Annie's. Mercer, along with Mae’s parents, represent the old school point of view in Mae’s life. He forces Mae to
confront the supposed benefits of the Circle’s innovations, arguing for privacy and meaningful face to face contact. He lost.
Compared with the daughter, Bill Paxton and Glenne Headly are great together
especially when Bill’s character, Vinnie, is having bad days due to his (I
assume) Parkinson’s.
Seeing the family together, let’s just say Mae feels like an adopted daughter because of how she speaks or Vinnie got sick working his ass off to send his daughter to abroad to study.
Seeing the family together, let’s just say Mae feels like an adopted daughter because of how she speaks or Vinnie got sick working his ass off to send his daughter to abroad to study.
For some reason I like how Emma and Star Wars, John Boyega, matched up in the movie. I wonder if it has to do anything with being British, having an accent, and the attempts to mask it. In any case they were able to help each other out.
Maybe if Mae and John, who plays is Ty Lafitte, creator of one of the programs under the Circle umbrella, had more scenes their chemistry would have held the movie together but the character of Ty feels like an extra.
Plus it doesn't make sense with all Ty's knowledge of the Circle and how he would help Emma, that him and Bailey would never have a scene. It's like Ty is just conveniently there; a ghost in a company that has an all seeing eye.
Perfect Technology CEO
Tom Hanks is
perfect as the Circle CEO, Eamon Bailey. Seeing him on the stage presenting like Steve Jobs; what harm will come to me
getting advice from the most trusted man in America?
In fact none of what
Bailey says in the movie is remotely illegal or villainous. He is, like most of
tech companies today, are beautiful and hopeful on the outside. It requires more scrutiny
to uncover the double edged blade hidden in the tech that can cut bought ways.
The Circle can
be many things in today’s technology scene. It has the circular campus of Apple, modified logo of Uber, and the diversified products of Google (now known
as Alphabet). Regardless of what real life tech company that the movie may be
hitting at, most of them practice collecting data from its consumers in order
to achieve that personalized service.
Mae’s first
journey to the company clinic is symbolic of how people approach the
services of the tech companies.
When the doctor informed her, after the fact,
that she had ingested sensors into her body she only expressed mild shock and
soon looked impressed at the data being collected about her body and transmitted
into the cloud.
She only asked if it was free and nothing else, a common consideration for the users of today.
Circle Cult and the Ending
What is it about
the word circle that reminds me of a cult? It is an apt name in this case.
Circle employees
are happy, always smiling, and without any contrarian dialogue against the
innovations of the company they so eagerly digest – like a cult. Considering it
is technology and not the sacrifice of virgins to an obscure deity it appears
to have an air of normalcy, like tech news.
Until the aftertaste kicks in and you wonder why people are still smiling, no hint of hesitation, in all the recording of data in real time – video, audio, even health data. Then again, maybe it is today’s reality, which is why it is so hard to notice.
Until the aftertaste kicks in and you wonder why people are still smiling, no hint of hesitation, in all the recording of data in real time – video, audio, even health data. Then again, maybe it is today’s reality, which is why it is so hard to notice.
For the same reason that the story strives to cement itself in a real world, the Circle did not have a definite ending that one would expect from a confrontation with hero and villain.
Mae did not have
a killing blow or any damaging evidence of a crime that would take a company
down although it was implied that such exists. She just used Bailey’s own
philosophy against him – no more secrets – and Circle employees welcomed it with
the same enthusiasm as any product launch.
The movie is
consistent that way in not overtly speaking any crime. Technology is never inherently evil. Consumers decide. In the end maybe that's the point of view the movie wants the audience to adopt.
I may be just
giving too much meaning to one curious piece of cinematography, if it is the
Director’s intention, the message is quite subtle.
When Mae was already advocating that ‘no secrets’ should apply to the founders of the company the stage and screen were shut off enveloping her in darkness. It was as if to imply the death of the circle.
Barely a minute passed the audience lighted her using their mobile screens. To me it means individuals are lighting the way instead of passively digesting whatever the big company. The company remains, the tech remains.
Mae never called out for the downfall of technology or that Bailey’s beliefs are wrong. What's left unless everything magically gets sent back to the bronze age is awareness, individual awareness.
When Mae was already advocating that ‘no secrets’ should apply to the founders of the company the stage and screen were shut off enveloping her in darkness. It was as if to imply the death of the circle.
Barely a minute passed the audience lighted her using their mobile screens. To me it means individuals are lighting the way instead of passively digesting whatever the big company. The company remains, the tech remains.
Mae never called out for the downfall of technology or that Bailey’s beliefs are wrong. What's left unless everything magically gets sent back to the bronze age is awareness, individual awareness.
When you get to the final shot, however, of Mae kayaking and monitored by 2 drones which then zooms out to more videos all over the world under the Circle’s cameras it sucked the air out of the confrontation scene prior.
What was the point of Annie and Mercer again, or Ty Lafitte (John Boyega)? Did she do right by her friends?
I can understand if the open ended finale that technology will always remain. Perhaps this is an attempt at a mind-fuck: a bigger monster evolves out of the world Bailey has created. Or, Mae is swallowed up by the system and all that; privacy is truly dead.
Yes that could work. But that requires me believing in the shock born out of the personal relationships of Mae which led her to reach such an ending. That is why the Circle fails to cut it.
I can understand if the open ended finale that technology will always remain. Perhaps this is an attempt at a mind-fuck: a bigger monster evolves out of the world Bailey has created. Or, Mae is swallowed up by the system and all that; privacy is truly dead.
Yes that could work. But that requires me believing in the shock born out of the personal relationships of Mae which led her to reach such an ending. That is why the Circle fails to cut it.
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