The Circle - A star-studded 'Black Mirror'

The darkly sci-fi TV show 'Black Mirror' is well known for its weekly plots showing us various 'What if?' scenarios regarding the use (or rather MIS-use!) of modern technology in the near future. 'The Circle' feels like it kind of belongs in the 'Black Mirror' universe, although possibly the main 'What if?' question I asked was, 'What if Black Mirror could afford A-list actors for an episode?'

In 'The Circle' a young woman (Emily Watson) joins a tech company which is pretty much a hybrid of Google, Facebook and Apple.  Everyone who works there is ultra dedicated to the corporate mantra and barely leave the 'campus' as everything they could ever want is at their fingertips.  It's headed up by the Steve Jobs-esque mogul, played effortlessly by Tom Hanks.  He charming, enigmatic and a natural leader who you can get behind due to his ultra-inspiring rhetoric.  But is he a good guy?  Our young and naïve intern (or 'guppy' as new employees are 'lovingly' referred to as!) soon realises that there's more going on than she had first thought.

The reason I'm dwelling on how much I felt like this was like part of the 'Black Mirror' series, is that some episodes of the show I liked and some I didn't.  It seemed my personal preference towards the TV show was based on how quickly I 'got' what they were trying to say.  If they managed to keep the show's true meaning a secret until the end, therefore giving some - even small - 'twist element' to the story then I found it left more of a lasting impact on me.  However, there were some episodes where it was painfully obvious what they were saying right from the start and, once you knew where it was going, you could almost write the rest of the tale yourself.  Unfortunately, despite 'The Circle's' great cast and fine performances (although if you thought that John Boyega was criminally-underused in 'The Last Jedi' then you won't appreciate the minimal screen time he's given here) you kind of can see what they're trying to say here and therefore where the film will go.

I certainly didn't hate 'The Circle.' The calibre of actors on show, plus the stylish was it was shot and the attempt to actually say something relevant about society and the effects modern technology is having on us and where we may go with it, made it worth a watch.  However, with all that it had going for it, I would have liked to see it going a little further and being a little less predictable with its story.

I haven't read the book it was based on, so I can't compare the two.  However, I understand that it wasn't as well-received during its US theatrical release as the producers would have liked.  I guess one indication of what you should expect from this film is the fact that the film-makers then chose not to give it a UK cinema release, instead opting for a 'straight-to-Netflix' launch.  of course if you have the popular streaming service then you're technically getting it as part of your subscription, in which case, you should probably add it to your ‘watch-list.’

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that