JonathanLB
Mar 9th, 2002, 08:31:05 PM
I just saw "Startup.com," a movie I had heard about and really wanted to see. It's an Artisan release, and here is what I am talking about as far as a great independent film! This movie is excellent.
It is all a documentary type of feature, all of the footage is totally real and unrehearsed, but that's why it obviously cannot be said to have bad acting because it's all not acting. It's just excellent real life drama. The camera work is a bit shaky of course, it would be literally impossible to get everything perfect when you are following people and filming what they do, instead of spending hours setting up a shot and whatnot.
Startup.com is the real life story of a company called GovWorks.com that raised $20 million in funding when the dot-com boom began and attempted to allow people to pay their parking tickets online and deal with other issues that would make the government function better for the people, using the Internet. Three friends co-founded the company, which grew to 8, then to 30, then 100, and eventually grew to 233 people before it dropped to 50 and ceased to exist.
It's a microcosm of the entire dot-com boom and the subsequent fall from grace, but it's not just about business. If anything, it's more about the relationship between two of the founders. Their relationship is tested because of the trying times with the Website and business, but at the end of the entire ordeal, all they really have is each other and that is more important than any business. They went on to found a new company in 2001 that helped struggling dot-coms.
I thought the editing of this movie was fantastic. It was really brilliantly put together and quite enjoyable. Not the type of movie most people normally see, obviously, and it really isn't much fit for the big screen, or not made for huge audiences, but it appealed to me especially because I started my business just before the dot-coms tanked and I've had to struggle through almost constantly decreasing advertising rates in a tough marketplace. This movie is a great look at the entire phenomenon.
The CEO of GovWorks actually was on the cover of numerous magazine covers, which the film shows, he met with Bill Clinton, he was on CNN, definitely quite a major player in the entire dot-com revolution.
There is no other film on this subject right now that I know of, but even that being said, Startup.com should stand the test of time as perhaps the best movie on a significant craze on Wall Street and a major boom in our history, the rise of the Internet as a viable business, but the realization that normal business rules of supply and demand, revenue and profits, all still apply.
Not everyone will like this movie. I am almost positive most of my friends would probably be bored to tears by it, but I found the movie compelling and dramatic, just because the actual story is compelling and the editing could not have been any better.
The obvious problem for most people will be: no special effects, amateur camera work, no real "action," and if you are not into films like Wall Street, Barbarians at the Gate, Boiler Room, etc., then you will not like it.
Still, this is a great independent movie in my opinion. This reminds me why I bother seeing the lesser known films, because every once in a while you do find a gem like Startup.com or Memento.
It is all a documentary type of feature, all of the footage is totally real and unrehearsed, but that's why it obviously cannot be said to have bad acting because it's all not acting. It's just excellent real life drama. The camera work is a bit shaky of course, it would be literally impossible to get everything perfect when you are following people and filming what they do, instead of spending hours setting up a shot and whatnot.
Startup.com is the real life story of a company called GovWorks.com that raised $20 million in funding when the dot-com boom began and attempted to allow people to pay their parking tickets online and deal with other issues that would make the government function better for the people, using the Internet. Three friends co-founded the company, which grew to 8, then to 30, then 100, and eventually grew to 233 people before it dropped to 50 and ceased to exist.
It's a microcosm of the entire dot-com boom and the subsequent fall from grace, but it's not just about business. If anything, it's more about the relationship between two of the founders. Their relationship is tested because of the trying times with the Website and business, but at the end of the entire ordeal, all they really have is each other and that is more important than any business. They went on to found a new company in 2001 that helped struggling dot-coms.
I thought the editing of this movie was fantastic. It was really brilliantly put together and quite enjoyable. Not the type of movie most people normally see, obviously, and it really isn't much fit for the big screen, or not made for huge audiences, but it appealed to me especially because I started my business just before the dot-coms tanked and I've had to struggle through almost constantly decreasing advertising rates in a tough marketplace. This movie is a great look at the entire phenomenon.
The CEO of GovWorks actually was on the cover of numerous magazine covers, which the film shows, he met with Bill Clinton, he was on CNN, definitely quite a major player in the entire dot-com revolution.
There is no other film on this subject right now that I know of, but even that being said, Startup.com should stand the test of time as perhaps the best movie on a significant craze on Wall Street and a major boom in our history, the rise of the Internet as a viable business, but the realization that normal business rules of supply and demand, revenue and profits, all still apply.
Not everyone will like this movie. I am almost positive most of my friends would probably be bored to tears by it, but I found the movie compelling and dramatic, just because the actual story is compelling and the editing could not have been any better.
The obvious problem for most people will be: no special effects, amateur camera work, no real "action," and if you are not into films like Wall Street, Barbarians at the Gate, Boiler Room, etc., then you will not like it.
Still, this is a great independent movie in my opinion. This reminds me why I bother seeing the lesser known films, because every once in a while you do find a gem like Startup.com or Memento.