The Social Network is a brilliant movie — expertly crafted down to the smallest detail, flawlessly acted, easily one of the best films of the year. And yet I feel like some of the effusive praise of the film is seeing something that isn’t there.

The film, which explores the cutthroat dynamics behind the conception, creation and explosion of Facebook, does not set out to make a grand statement about the way people communicate in the 21st century. I’ve read a lot of commentary about the irony of a borderline anti-social person creating the ultimate social community, but I didn’t see that on the screen. This film could have been about the creation of anything… Facebook is entirely beside the point.

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