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Revenge of the Nerd

The Social Network (David Fincher, 2010)

Early in David Fincher’s Facebook origin story The Social Network, nerdy and socially inept Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) is chatting to the Winklevoss twins (both played by Armie Hammer). Zuckerberg has proven himself a programming whiz with a campus-blitzing piece of computer hacking; they’re a pair of old-money golden boys looking to recruit him to work on their start-up web business. Despite the modern trappings, the exchange is filtered through more traditional power dynamics, with the tall, good-looking, WASP Winklevosses deigning to let the thin, geeky, Jewish Zuckerberg into the entry hall of their exclusive campus fraternity. It’s at that moment that the analogy between David Fincher’s prestigious Oscar-favourite drama and a campus fraternity comedy such as Animal House snaps into focus.

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