Director: Matt Johnson
Writers: Matt Johnson, Jacquie McNish, and Matthew Miller
Stars: Jay Baruchel, Glenn Howerton, Matt Johnson
Synopsis: The story of the meteoric rise and catastrophic demise of the world’s first smartphone.
Matt Johnson’s new abrasive comedy, Blackberry, is just as much about true genius as it is about the drive never to settle or rest on your laurels. The rise and spectacular fall of the world’s first smartphone, created and sold from Waterloo, Ontario, once held 45% of the global market share. A few years later, the company formerly known as Research In Motion (RIM) had zero in a jaw-dropping fall from grace. How? By developing a dangerous level of hubris in themselves, their product, and their place in society by thinking they reached their own capacity in a constantly evolving field.
Blackberry tells the story of Mike Lazaridis (Jay Baruchel), a Turkish immigrant who immigrated with his Pontic Greek parents when he was five years old. He started RIM out of a small strip mall with his best friend Douglas Fregin (Johnson), with dreams of bringing everything your computer can do to a phone. The goal was to use a free, untapped wireless signal across North America with their invention, PocketLink. As Doug describes it, a device is a computer, page, and “email machine” all in one.
At least, that’s the pitch they make to Jim Balsillie (Glenn Howerton), who is intrigued enough about the idea to look up from the notes for a meeting he’s about to hijack. A melon-headed pompous blowhard, Balsillie knows one thing about business and bluntly interrupts their pitch by telling them they need a better name. Later, after being let go from his job, he shows up at RIM’s offices and eventually strikes a deal to become the co-CEO with Lazaridis, infusing the type of institutional arrogance that was ultimately the company’s downfall.
Blackberry’s script was written by Matt Miller and adapted from the nonfiction business book, Losing the Signal: The Untold Story Behind the Extraordinary Rise and Spectacular Fall of BlackBerry by Jacquie McNish and Sean Silcoff. The film’s shooting style has the look and feel of a mockumentary, as the camera zooms in to capture reaction shots of critical characters. This brings a sense of what these three were doing, breaking the rules and making new ones as they went along. Miller evolves the true story into an absurdist comedy that embraces the theme that it’s easier to ask for forgiveness later than to ask for permission from the start.
The film is perfectly cast, with Johnson saving some of the funniest lines from Miller’s script for himself. Baruchel still brings some of his trademark neurotic style, but he plays the role with more of a stoic quality than one would expect. He has the film’s best scene, exasperatingly trying to explain to the board of Bell Atlantic that new competitors just don’t have that trademark and satisfying Blackberry trademark typewriter click when typing out messages. However, the film develops its infused caustic sting from Howerton, who captures Balsillie’s well-known hostile style in a way that moves the film’s story quickly.
I’ll admit, I had more fun with Blackberry than most, purely for nostalgia’s sake. Growing up across the border from Waterloo, I once owned and loved my Blackberry Bold. I even held the Blackberry Storm in my hands and sent it back because it never worked, then never receiving a replacement. Even the well-known failure of Balsillie trying to bring the NHL to Hamilton, Ontario, is still fresh in my memory. It’s a trend now in films, from Ben Affleck’s Air to the upcoming Flamin’ Hot, of films capturing moments in time that changed the world in some small or large way. Johnson’s Blackberry works as a work of sentimentality for the past but also teaches us to always keep an eye out for what will happen in the future.
