Facebook is taking a shellacking this week with two films focusing on the social media giant: one, a broader documentary on the real-world social media problem. The other dramatizes the Frances Haugen/Jeff Horwitz investigation as a feature film. One focuses on how social media became the catalyst for the “attention economy,” while the other hyperfocuses on the biggest social media app with the largest user base.
The documentary, available today, is Your Attention Please. The dramatized feature, The Social Reckoning, detailing the dramatic fallout and pushback, is set to debut in theatres this Friday, Oct. 9.
The film isn’t a conventional sequel to the 2010 flick, The Social Network. But Aaron Sorkin instead calls it a companion piece. The Social Network was about creating Facebook, while The Social Reckoning is about what Facebook became and its societal consequences.
The film follows Facebook engineer Frances Haugen (Mikey Madison), whose growing safety concerns continue to get downplayed and ignored. She later connects with a Wall Street Journal reporter, Jeff Horwitz (Jeremy Allen White), who believes her safety concerns are just the beginning of the company’s problems. Sorkin & Co. present a drama-infused unveiling of what would be known as the “Facebook Files” and the frantic actions within the company to find a response.
Jeremy Strong fully embraced his role as Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, presenting a seemingly lifeless, out-of-touch tech bro gone full Wall Street. Once the social media giant went public in 2012, we knew it was only a matter of time before priorities would shift and trouble would brew. Right before its Initial Public Offering (IPO) in May of that year, the company was valued at $104 billion. Today, now known as Meta, the company is worth an estimated $1.5 trillion.
The film is broken into three parts: “White Girl Wasted,” “Meaningful Social Interactions (MSI),” and “We’re Gonna Get Blamed for This.” While the film is divided into a trio of parts, the direction wasn’t linear, thanks to the constant back-and-forth between 2019 and 2021. Frances Hauge, a member of the Civic Integrity Team, noticed disturbing changes within the company that she kept to herself. One of the biggest changes came after her team presented a host of safety issues. After a short presentation that conveyed a loss of 1% of users, the Civic Integrity Team was absorbed into another department, rendering their safety concerns meaningless. Had he gone along with the proposed changes, misinformation sharing would’ve been reduced by 38%, a problem that plagues most social media platforms today.
Mikey Madison did a good job in a role that built a confident whistleblower from the ground up. Single with low confidence, she went from a quiet, celiac battling data scientist to breaking one of the biggest stories of the last decade. Things really took off after a coworker, played by Anna Lambe, used deductive reasoning to identify Haugen as the leaker and handed her a jump drive. She was instructed to get it to Horwitz, “before they (Facebook) promote Instagram Kids.” Landing another secondary role after Heart of the Beast, Lambe is not only likeable, but has the potential to use this as a launchpad to an even larger project.
The film feels like more of a Zuckerberg hit piece than a “companion piece” to a hit feature film from 16 years ago. On that note, this companion piece is coming far too late to make the same type of noise The Social Network did. There were great individual performances, à la Wunmi Mosaku, Bill Burr, Betty Gilpin, and Lambe, but overall, the plane doesn’t land. The film arrives two months after Meta’s $15 billion settlement with 48 states that sued on claims of youth addiction and child safety.
The Social Reckoning gets an 8 out of 10. There’s not much suspense since you know what happens, but there was plenty of drama. One of the most disturbing parts of the film was in the “war room” at Facebook as they watched the events of Jan. 6th take place in real time. The back-and-forth transitions between the Capitol and the war room were powerful. Ultimately, you can wait until this is available to stream.
The Social Reckoning premieres in theaters on Oct. 9.
-Jon Jones
Photos: Courtesy of Sony
Genre: Biography/Drama/Thriller
Rating: R
Runtime: 1 hr 52 mins
Trailer: Watch
U.S. Release Date: October 9, 2026