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Riester 1 Caroline Riester Dr. McLaughlin Writing and Rhetoric 10 October 2014 The Price of Success The Social Network, directed by David Fincher, was released in 2010. It was written by Aaron Sorkin and produced by Columbia Pictures. The movie is based on the true story of the founding of the popular social media site, Facebook. It follows Mark Zuckerberg founded the site with his best friend Eduardo Saverin while they were students at Harvard. Facebook started out as a small social media site for college students, but was later made public to the whole world. The Social Network employs many different rhetorical and visual techniques in order to call on and persuade the viewers to question and critique what it means to be successful and to develop their own individual definition of success. Rhetoric is an important aspect of films and television. In Herrick‟s “An Overview of Rhetoric”, the art of rhetoric is defined to be “the systematic study and intentional practice of effective symbolic expression” and it‟s often used for the purpose of persuasion (7). Films are created for a purpose. The purpose could be to persuade people, inform people, or to create beauty. Rhetoric can be used in all of these instances to help the movie be successful in its purpose. Rhetoric is adapted to an audience, reveals human motives, and seeks persuasion (Herrick 7). The writers of The Social Network use rhetoric in a very effective way during the film. It is adapted to the younger audience that they would like to reach with their message about the definition of success. The rhetoric of this film also reveals human motives in how we think about and strive for success. This film seeks to persuade the audience to critique the

Riester 2 definitions of success that are explored in the film by using visual and rhetorical techniques to paint these versions of success in different lights. The writer of The Social Network uses characterization to create well-developed characters that have strong beliefs about what success means to them. In “The Rhetorical Situation”, Lloyd Bitzer claims “The rhetor alters reality by bringing into existence a discourse of such a character that the audience, in thought and action, is so engaged that it becomes the mediator of change. In this sense rhetoric is always persuasive.” (4) The writer and director of this movie use characterization rhetorically to persuade the audience to examine the different views of success in the film by making certain characters, thus their version of success, more appealing. One of these characters is Eduardo Saverin. He is shown throughout the film to have strong morals and a kind heart. When Mark asks him for money, Eduardo always gives it to him even if he doesn‟t initially want to. This makes Eduardo look weak and like he can‟t really stick up for himself. It is made clear in several ways that Eduardo‟s version of success is making money. From the creation of Facebook that Eduardo wants to make money by advertising on the site. Mark, however, does not want Facebook to be this way and always shuts down Eduardo‟s attempts to do so. Eduardo also has a professional, businessman look to him that can make him seem like he is boring and no fun to the audience. This idea of Eduardo and the fact that he can‟t stick up for himself causes his idea of success seem less appealing to the audience. It makes the audience think that it involves all work and no fun. By characterizing Eduardo in this way, the writer is persuading the audience to not choose his definition of success right from the beginning of the film. The character of Sean Parker is developed in the opposite way of Eduardo. He has a very different view of what success is. Unlike Eduardo, Sean doesn‟t believe that the most important

Riester 3 form of success is making money. It is made clear throughout the movie that he lost all of his money and ran some businesses into the ground, but he still considers himself successful. He founded Napster, a free music-sharing site when he was young, but as Sean says in The Social Network “There's not a lot of money in free music, even less when you're being sued by everyone who's ever been to the Grammys.” Sean is characterized to be cool and popular, which is more of his definition of success than being rich is. Sean is always shown as being surrounded by girls and parties and fun music. This makes his version of success very appealing to the other characters in the film, especially Mark. The difference between Sean and Eduardo is best shown in the scene where Eduardo and Mark meet Sean for the first time. Eduardo is all dressed up while the other characters seem to be more casually dressed. Sean walks in with girls and party music and immediately orders a round of drinks for the table. Throughout the scene, Sean is shown to be laughing and having a great time while Eduardo is not. This is also the scene where the audience begins to see Mark choosing Sean‟s idea of success over Eduardo‟s at the same time that the audience is making this decision also. The director of The Social Network also uses various visual and editing techniques throughout the film to persuade the audience to be a part of the decision Mark has to make about what success is to him. One of these techniques is the placement of the camera. In many scenes in the film, the camera is placed right in the scene, making the audience feel like a part of the action, not just an outside viewer. In The Rhetoric Of The Frame, Judith Lancioni claims, “The same camera work that discourages passive spectatorship encourages viewers to engage in the kind of self-confrontation that will enable them to experience „alternative subject positions‟” (111). In other words, camera work is able to invite viewers into the frame and have an experience that can change their position on something, such as their own definition of success.

Riester 4 During the opening scene of the film Mark and his girlfriend Erica are siting at a table at a bar. The camera is placed right at the table so the audience feels like the third person at their table. Another scene uses a camera view from Mark‟s point of view, which places the audience inside of Mark‟s mind. The strategic camera placements make the audience feel as though they are right there beside Mark, trying to decide what success is defined as. Another editing technique that the director uses to help persuade the audience to question what success means is sound editing. Whenever Sean is in a scene, for instance, party-type music usually accompanies him. This makes him and his version of success seem fun and popular. Another scene that employs the use of sound to help persuade the audience is in the final scene. At first, when Mark is talking to a female lawyer on his case, there is no background music and you can only hear the dialogue. The silence remains throughout the scene, which gives an idea of the isolation and loneliness that Mark is feeling at that moment and makes the audience feel bad for him. He chose one version of success and ended up losing his best friend. He is alone and hated by many. The director uses sound editing and other visual techniques to persuade the audience members to ask themselves if being famous and “successful” is worth it if you end up alone and miserable at the end. The director also uses various literary elements to help persuade the audience to question what success means. One of these elements is symbolism. As mentioned earlier, rhetoric is the study and practice of symbolic expression (Herrick 7). Symbols are used to persuade and compel audiences and rhetoric is the art of this. Each character in the film symbolizes something different for Mark. Eduardo represents Mark‟s conscience. From the beginning of the film, Eduardo is always shown trying to do the right thing. The first time we see Eduardo is after Mark gets dumped by Erica in the opening seen and Eduardo comes over to check on Mark and see if

Riester 5 he‟s okay. This shows what a great friend Eduardo is and that he really cares for Mark. Eduardo also tries to convince Mark that Facemash is a bad idea. He feels uncomfortable with the idea of hacking girl‟s privacy and sharing their pictures online for the enjoyment of men and he also knows that Mark could get in big trouble for doing this. Eduardo tries to do the right thing, but in the end it leads to him being squeezed out of the company by Mark and Sean. The act of cutting Eduardo out of the company is the moment when it becomes very clear that Mark has chosen the other form of success, Sean‟s success. Sean, on the other hand, symbolizes everything that Mark wants to be. Sean is well known and extremely popular. Mark was never popular at school and didn‟t get to go to the fun and exclusive parties. Mark always wanted to be in a Final Club, but was never asked to join. Sean represents Mark‟s new “Final Club” in the new stage in his life. Mark wants to be accepted by Sean and brought into his world. Sean and Eduardo represent two completely opposite things. They are almost like the angel and devil sitting on Mark‟s shoulders where Eduardo tells him to do what‟s right and Sean tells him to do what‟s cool and fun, even if it‟s wrong. Sean tells Mar that he should move his company out to California, but Eduardo doesn‟t think that‟s a good idea. He warns against it, but Mark does it anyway. This puts a strain on their friendship and the company‟s success for a while. Mark sides with Sean in the end and kicks Eduardo out of the company, but in doing so he loses his conscience and his best friend. Another literary element the director uses to call the audience to criticize the definition of success is irony. Irony is when one uses words or actions in which the intended meaning is different and often opposite from their actual meaning. Irony can be used effectively to persuade people because it can turn the opposing idea against itself and revealing deeper truths. Irony is used in this film to show that something that once seemed like it was what you wanted, such as a

Riester 6 certain definition of success, may end up causing you to achieve the opposite of what you intended. One of the best examples of this irony in the film is the fact that Mark created the ultimate social networking site to connect people around the world, but in the end he is more alone than ever. This is best shown in the closing scene of the film. Mark is sitting alone in a room after the hearings have ended, and not in his favor. He opens his computer and logs into Facebook, where he searches for his ex-girlfriend Erica before adding her as a friend. The movie ends with Mark constantly refreshing the page, hoping to see that she accepted his friend request. This is the ultimate irony in the film. Even though Mark created the biggest social networking site in the world, he is still denied and left on the outside. Some people might not believe that one of the intents of The Social Network was to persuade the audience to examine the meaning of success. A main argument for this belief is the likability of the characters. Overall, people tend to like Eduardo and dislike Sean. Eduardo is a nice, genuine guy while Sean appears to be quite the opposite. Critics may ask how the film is persuading the audience to at first follow Sean‟s form of success and not Eduardo‟s even though Eduardo is characterized to be a much better and more likable guy. People may claim that if the writer wanted to make Sean‟s success more appealing, he would have made Sean more likable. Although his may be true, it can be said that likability doesn‟t have much affect on success as the characters see it. The audience may like Eduardo more, but it is clear that he is less successful than Sean. Sean may be arrogant and selfish, but it can‟t be denied that he has been successful by his own definition. Likability of the characters, then, has little to do with success as the characters define it so the audience is persuaded to look at other things about the characters and film itself in order to call into question the definition of success.

Riester 7 Success is something that nearly everybody strives for in life. Each person has an individualized belief of what success means. Some people, like Eduardo Saverin, believe that success means making money. Other people, like Sean Parker, are more inclined to believe that success is being famous and cool. The writer and director of The Social Network use this film to call people to closer examine this question of what success means. In An Overview of Rhetoric, Herrick states “Rhetorical discourse is usually intended to influence an audience to accept an idea, and then act in a manner consistent with that idea.” (12) The use many rhetorical techniques, such as characterization, editing, symbolism, and irony attempts to persuade the audience into believing at first that a certain form of success is correct and then showing why it is actually wrong. Mark Zuckerberg became rich and famous through the creation of Facebook, but he ended up more alone than ever. This ending causes the audience to look at his method, and other methods of achieving success, in order to determine whether they are totally worth it. The audience is persuaded to not only question what success means and how it is achieved, but to also then develop a definition of success to strive for in real life.

Riester 8 Works Cited Bitzer, Lloyd F. "The Rhetorical Situation." Philosophy & Rhetoric 1.1 (1968): 1-14.

Penn

State University Press. Print. Herrick, James A. "An Overview of Rhetoric." The History and Theory of Rhetoric: An Introduction. 2nd ed. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2001. N. pag. Print. Lancioni, Judith. “The Rhetoric of the Frame: Revisioning Archival Photographs in the War.” Visual Rhetoric: A Reader in Communication and American Culture.

Civil

Newbury

Park, CA: SAGE Publications, 2008. Print.] The Social Network. Dir. David Fincher. Screenplay by Aaron Sorkin. Perf. Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield and Justin Timberlake. Sony, 2010. DVD.