Steve Jobs was not one of my heroes. I’ve always been a Bill Gates man. Until he died, I knew next to nothing about Jobs. After watching Steve Jobs, I feel like I now know nothing.
The bulk of Steve Jobs sees Steve as he prepares three product launches. We watch him wander around backstage and yell at his underlings. He interacts with a slightly mad woman he may or may not have had a daughter with. The child hangs around as well and Steve appears to be fond of her. He doesn’t not appear to be very fond of many people. He’s portrayed as an autistic or maybe a psychopath. He lacks the human ability to feel empathy and he is immune to the suffering of others.
We see a handful of people who helped bring Apple out of a garage and into the world. Steve Jobs has no use for any of these people. He appears to believe that he gave birth to Apple whole from his forehead one afternoon. He is a master at media manipulation and uses his Hitler-like charisma to swoon the media into calling him a genius, though all those around him at Apple seem to think he is nothing but a huckster.
Movies about Steve Jobs go out of their way to show that he was an asshole. Maybe he was, I’m just not sure I need to see any more movies exploring that part of his story.
Steve Jobs was a good looking film. I liked all the actors, the sets were cool, the music was good. This little slice of Steve Jobs story about product launches and his daughter was a tad on the dull side. Who cares? was a thought that came to me many times during two hours of watching Steve yell at people, demand someone give him their shirt, and tell the great and powerful Woz that he would always give me a Pass.
We never see Steve do anything here. Is it the film’s conviction that Steve Jobs was just a conman who worked the greatest shell game of all time? If so, why was Apple lost without him and a titan once he returned? As with the Ashton Kutcher film, we stop well before anything interesting happens. Maybe this was meant to be part one of three.
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