Some films age well because they seem timeless. Others age well because they reflect a particular moment and our perceptions of them shift in enriching ways. When it appeared in 2010, The Social Network benefited from some of our then-naïve fascination with social media. This was a story of American entrepreneurship in which Mark Zuckerberg was a flawed hero, but his antagonists were even less sympathetic, and we got to watch him build a billion-dollar business from a dorm room.   

Fifteen years later, it’s impossible to read the film as a tale of plucky success. Social networks are no longer primarily about connecting with family and friends. We find ourselves in a society that has been profoundly shaped by social media and by the choices of the people who own tech empires. In some places and moments, lives have been completely upended.  

David Fincher (Se7en, Zodiac) has long been interested in the darkness in men’s souls, and he makes an ideal pairing with screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing), an expert in depicting men (and occasionally women) who are trying to show off how smart they are. Together they created a film that is, in the tradition of Citizen Kane or There Will Be Blood, an essential examination of the excesses and ethics of American capitalism.