Movie Review: BLACKBERRY

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: May 12th, 2023 / 01:06 AM

BLACKBERRY movie poster | ©2023 IFCFilms

Rating: R
Stars: Jay Baruchel, Glenn Howerton, Matt Johnson, Rich Sommer, Michael Ironside, Martin Donovan, Michelle Giroux, SungWon Cho, Mark Critch, Saul Rubinek, Cary Elwes
Writers: Matt Johnson & Mark Miller, based on the book LISTENING TO THE SIGNAL by Jacquie McNish & Sean Silcoff
Director: Matt Johnson
Distributor: IFC Films
Release Date: May 12, 2023

BLACKBERRY begins with a title that informs us, “The following fictionalization is inspired by real people and real events that took place in Waterloo, Ontario.”

What comes next plays out something like what the tech dark comedy SILICON VALLEY might have been like if it was set in the relative recent past, was based in fact, and turned into human tragedy by the end.

People who were around in the ‘90s and ‘00s remember the BlackBerry, the early cell phone with a physical keyboard. But how it came into being, how it became almost universally used, and why it flamed out – yes, the iPhone was part of its decline, but not the whole reason – is what we learn from BLACKBERRY.

Screenwriters Matt Johnson, who also directs, & Mark Miller, working from the book LISTENING TO THE SIGNAL by Jacquie McNish & Sean Silcoff, keep their story very much in the BlackBerry business. We go from start to finish without learning whether any of the characters have home lives, much less what those lives are like. The tech innovators are all about tech, and fun (at least at first); the sales people are all about sales, and status; the bottom line people are all about the money.

Grainy handheld footage introduces us to prematurely white-haired Mike Lazaridis (Jay Baruchel), his best friend Doug Fregin (filmmaker Johnson), and their merry band of creators. They actually formed their company Research in Motion, which became BlackBerry Ltd., in 1984.

However, BLACKBERRY starts in the ‘90s, when Mike and Doug do a disastrous sales pitch for their new device to Sutherland/Schulz exec Jim Balsillie (Glenn Howerton). Doug instinctively doesn’t trust Jim. The audience has reason to back up this distrust – we see him undermine a colleague, be rude to people he called into his office in the first place, and (gasp) hasn’t seen STAR WARS.

Even so, Jim sees value in Mike and Doug’s vision of what we know today as the cellphone. Jim offers to invest badly-needed funds in exchange for major stake in the company and eventually accepts being co-CEO with Mike.

Mike handles the engineering, Jim sells BlackBerrys to the major phone companies, and for a while, the company is golden. The work environment is playful and productive, and the product has worldwide popularity.

We see there are not only temperamental but philosophical differences between Mike and Jim. When Jim counsels Mike not to let perfect be the enemy of good, Mike retorts, “Good enough is the enemy of humanity.”

How and why Mike’s idealism gradually erodes is at the center of BLACKBERRY. Focused on the tech to the exclusion of almost everything else, he doesn’t at first register the change in the company work culture as Jim puts increasing effort to make Research in Motion more like a normal corporation. And then Mike gets defensive.

Baruchel puts a lot of soul into his portrayal of Mike Lazaridis, which is aided by the script. Th writing provides a less well-rounded portrait of Jim Balsillie. Howerton is excellent at giving us the man’s ambition and rage, but we can’t tell exactly what’s driving his counterproductive obsession in the third act.

BLACKBERRY’s heart seems to be with Doug, who (at least in the film) has the best grasp in what keeps the creative engineers at the company. However, because Doug himself is not extensively defined here, again, it’s hard to figure out his relationship to the technology. (According to articles about the real Doug Fregin, he was and is a major innovator.)

Although BLACKBERRY could have gone deeper with certain characters and themes, it succeeds in remaining intriguing throughout, and exuding a genuine sense of regret by its end.

Follow us on Twitter at ASSIGNMENT X
Like us on Facebook at ASSIGNMENT X

Latest Buzz

Movie Review: BLACKBERRY

Somewhere between tragedy and SILICON VALLEY

Article Source: Assignment X
Article: Movie Review: BLACKBERRY

Related

Related Posts:

Leave a Comment

Assignment X Poll

Newsletter subscription status

Latest Buzz

Movie Review: BLACKBERRY

Somewhere between tragedy and SILICON VALLEY

Article Source: Assignment X Article: Movie Review: BLACKBERRY

Related

Related Posts:

Leave a Comment

Assignment X Poll

Article Source: Assignment X
Article: Movie Review: BLACKBERRY