Steve Jobs

For many, Apple founder Steve Jobs was a visionary who changed the world forever. To others, he was a self-absorbed bully who drove those around him, as well as his employees, insane. The truth, as always, probably lies somewhere in between. There have been several books and movies that have tried to approach the man and the myth of Steve Jobs. Now, Oscar winner Danny Boyle has also ventured to portray this controversial man with the means of cinema. However, he has decided against directing a classic biopic. Rather, the screenplay by multi-award-winning writer Aaron Sorkin focuses on three defining moments in Jobs' life and work, presented in a kind of virtuosically directed chamber drama.

Steve Jobs observes the title character (Michael Fassbender) before the presentation of the Macintosh in 1984, of NeXT during his Apple hiatus in 1988, and that of the iMac in 1998. The conversations Jobs has with people like his marketing boss and confidante Joanna Hoffman (Kate Winslet), Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen), his ex-lover Chrisann Brennan (Katherine Waterston), and even his one-time mentor John Sculley (Jeff Daniels) in the heated minutes before the big performances are pure fiction. But they are meant to capture the character of Steve Jobs, as well as his professional career and its importance. And the film succeeds admirably in this.

Keeping in mind that over a running time of two hours there are only three scenes in which there is actually only walking and talking, Danny Boyle has succeeded in making an extremely engaging and entertaining film, both aesthetically and dramaturgically. The look changes from scene to scene, with a rather grainy image in the 84 sequence dominating the action, while the third scene - like the product presented there - is clearly technically superior. Thus, the technical progress is not only dramaturgically, but also visually clarified. Long tracking shots, which perfectly capture the hectic hustle and bustle behind the scenes of such a product presentation, also ensure that the production, despite the spatial limitations, looks large and worthy of a cinema screen.

But the heart of the film is the great script, whose cleverness, bite and wit has also been very well translated into German. The dialogue duels that the protagonists engage in here are extremely engaging and work so well in part because the actors do a first-rate job of transporting them from paper to screen. Every scene between Michael Fassbender and Kate Winslet is a treat to watch, Seth Rogen gets to show that he can really act, and Jeff Daniels provides some of the strongest moments of the entire film with his appearance. Granted, Steve Jobs may not be an entertainment film in the classic sense of the word, not a work for mass audiences who thirst for pace not so much with dialogue but with the rest of the plot. But who appreciates first-class written acting cinema, gets here cinematic high pleasure.

May be that one can accuse the film of inaccuracies in the representation of facts or of people. It may also be that viewers who expected more of a classic biopic will be disappointed by this reduced dramaturgy. But that doesn't change the fact that Danny Boyle has made a great film in terms of craftsmanship and acting, which with its intelligent screenplay can make up for all other points of criticism. Head cinema in the best sense of the word and therefore also: Absolutely worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp