Review: ‘The Circle:’ a Movie with a Definite Purpose, but Blurred Vision


The makers of “The Circle” take a dig at the modern capabilities of the Internet, specifically the ones that invade users’ privacy and create a virtual environment of constant surveillance and monitoring—all at the promise of serving the world in a better way. How invasive, risky, and even dangerous all that monitoring can be, has been showcased very explicitly. Even younger audiences would be able to guess that the movie is a direct hit at undeniably the most powerful Internet company in the world—Google. 

Tom Hanks (as Eamon Bailey) and Emma Watson (as Mae Holland) are very natural in their roles without trying too hard. Mae Holland is a promising coming-of-age girl who, despite belonging to a slightly disadvantaged family, is strong in her determination to be successful in her career. Growing up seeing Emma Watson’s utterly brave and down-to-earth nature in the “Harry Potter” movies, it would be very justified to say that casting her as Mae in “The Circle” has been a good decision.

Eamon Bailey, who heads the company, The Circle, is a witty boss equipped with an innovative mindset, convincing nature, and an apparently easy approach toward running the company. From the beginning, the story of the film knows its course and unfolds itself in a well-maintained pace till the end, exactly where it stumbles and leaves the audience confused. 

The setup of Eamon’s powerful company including its location, ambience, etc., has been somewhat framed within a limited budget, contrary to what the audience might expect to see. There are multiple aspects of the script that make little sense. In an organization of such large scale, shouldn’t there be hundreds of other leaders who take the charge in conducting meetings instead of the CEO himself doing it all the time?

Also, very surprisingly, in addition to the area where the physical servers of the company are kept, the room or vault that holds the most valued documents and credentials of the company is left without security? Strange! And that’s not it! Within a very short period of time after Mae joins the organization, she is offered a new and bigger role? How often does all that happen, to be honest?

No doubt that the actors have done a good job and the subject investigated by the makers of the film is of serious concern. It is, rather, the other parts of the filming that seem to have missed the mark. Audiences who have watched “The Internship” (2013) starring Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn might remember the huge and lively atmosphere of Google as was created at that time for the film. The ambience does play an important role, if not the most important one. 

The concept of this movie, though, revolving around privacy invasion issues will, of course, spark curiosity in the viewers and inspire them to become more authoritative of their own data that they voluntarily or involuntarily share with internet companies—a kind of takeaway you don’t get from the cinema very often!