The paradox of Facebook

“The Social Network” is only half successful. The movie by David Fincher, which presents the origin of Facebook between love and betrayal, is not doing well at the Italian box office. During the first few days it has been on, the movie has only obtained the third place in the chart, beaten by the Italian comedy “Maschi contro femmine”, which has been on for three weeks now. The American movie has made 814,932 euros compared to 1,365,173 euros of the Italian film by Fausto Brizzi. Therefore, the latter movie reaches 11,2 million euros and it is getting ready to catch up with another record breaking Italian movie “Benvenuti al sud”, which has already passed 27 million euros.

The case of “The Social Network” is peculiar for various reasons; in the States, it was a success and it made 22 million dollars in the first week-end (by now, it has passed 100 million in the United States and 150 million in the world); also, the critics were practically unanimous in judging the movie a masterpiece (according to estimates, it has 97% positive reviews), so high that many consider it as one of the favourite for next February’s Academy Awards, even though it is a little early to tell.

But the data that makes the disappointing Italian result a paradox concerns the relationship between Facebook and the Italians. In less than two years, Italy has shot to the top of the world’s charts for Facebook usage. About 15 million Italians use it and they spend six and a half hours a month in front of the computer screen. In short, the Italians know this social network very well, but they do not seem to care much for the movie.