‘I’m most scared of unfulfilled potential...’
In 2017, Tom Hanks and Emma Watson combined for a sci-fi ‘thriller’ that acts as a Black Mirror style commentary on surveillance and social media. If you’re wondering why you’ve never heard of something that, on paper, sounds so appealing, that’ll be because it is absolutely, mesmerizingly dogshit…
Mae (Watson) is a young idealist who becomes a plaything for a powerful tech company after agreeing to have every aspect of her life broadcast online for all to see. Inspired by tech magnate Bailey (Hanks) and his right hand man Stenton (Patton Oswalt), Mae attempts to navigate life as an internet celebrity whilst struggling to maintain her personal relationships.
Where to start. Maybe with the fact that Mae, our supposed protagonist, is potentially the least likable character in the history of cinema. Smug, pretentious and utterly unrealistic, it is genuinely quite frightening to think that anyone could find her appealing in any conceivable way. By the end I was actively rooting for her to fail, although the plot is so bewildering and confusing that I was never sure if she was failing or, in fact, succeeding. Hanks sleepwalks his way through the whole thing, something I never thought possible, and John Boyega cannot save his character Ty from being an incomprehensible addition to what is an already ludicrous plot.
The whole thing looks genuinely disgusting, like an SNL reimagining of the Apple headquarters, and the tone created by director James Ponsoldt sits somewhere between lecture from an internet conspiracy theorist and a TED talk by Clippy – the mascot of Microsoft Word. The themes of surveillance and privacy are as old and hackneyed as time itself, and Ponsoldt has absolutely nothing new to say on the matter.
The Circle is an abomination. No redeeming qualities. Nothing of any substance. Cliched to the point of inanity. This is a film that deserved to bomb to the point of being completely forgotten the moment that it was released. And that’s what happened. Sometimes the universe gets it right.