The Circle

This information-age thriller tries to tackle relevant topics like privacy and accountability, but its presentation is so opaque and plasticky that it might have come from a computer on Prozac. The Circle starts promisingly enough, like a more updated Antitrust (2001), with appealing characters and an exciting setting. Then Mae takes such a puzzling left turn. Not only is it difficult to identify with her, but when she verbally argues her decision, it sounds wooden and hollow. In fact, all of the characters trying to (ironically) speak up in favor of a total lack of privacy sound fake. (Is that the point of the movie? If so, it's not clear.)

It's all so horribly disappointing, given the skill that writer/director James Ponsoldt has shown on his three previous, excellent features (Smashed, The Spectacular Now, and The End of the Tour), all of which dealt with deeply, movingly human flaws. Now whatever human touch he might have brought to the material is gone, and he seems to have no handle on how to make a paranoid thriller with inhuman stakes. It's baffling, considering that Dave Eggers co-wrote the screenplay based on his own book, and the cast -- including the late Bill Paxton and a musical appearance by Beck -- is above reproach. Wherever The Circle went wrong is, for now, a mystery.