Every month, Daniel Bernstein watches an old movie of questionable quality. Armed with the belief that there are lessons to be learned in all situations, he and another Steel Bananas columnist attempt to find meaning where maybe there isn’t any. This month, Daniel sits with Borna Radnik and examines the techno-thriller ‘The Net’ starring Sandra Bullock and Dennis Miller.

Synopsis – Spoiler Warning

Angela Bennet (Bullock) is a hacker and system analyst for Cathedral, a large software company. Angela works entirely from her home, and her interactions with other people are limited to her Alzheimer’s stricken mother and the people on an internet chatroom. One day she stumbles upon a strange piece of code hidden in a securities program known as Gatekeeper. Before she has a chance to truly examine this, she goes off on vacation to Mexico.

It is here that she meets the seemingly charming Jack Devlin (Northam). Devlin wastes no time seducing Angela before revealing that he is a member of the Praetorians, an organization attempting to take over the world and the one responsible for Gatekeeper. Devlin then tries to kill Angela who narrowly escapes death.

When she comes to in a hospital a few weeks later she finds that her identity has been stolen and been replaced with that of a woman named Ruth Knox. Angela frantically tries to reclaim her life, only to find it blocked by Devlin and the sorid facts that he makes up about Knox and places on them internet. In desperation, Angela turns to the only person who knows her, an ex boyfriend and former therapist (Miller).

Devlin remains one step ahead. After murdering the ex-boyfriend and getting Angela set to prison (then breaking her out to toy with her), Angela finally snaps and breaks into Cathedral where she finds the real Ruth Knox pretending to be her. After some clever computer work, Angela manages to regain her identity, eliminate Devlin and Knox, and destroy the Gatekeeper program. She lives happily ever after, taking care of her mother and generally staying away from mysterious chatrooms.

Borna

The Internet is an amazing creation. Who would have guessed fifteen years ago that sites such as Youtube, Facebook, Google Earth street view, and of course Steel Bananas could exist? The answer: not Sandra Bullock in the ’95 cyber thriller The Net. Bullock plays Angela Bennett, a computer nerd who somehow stumbles upon a conspiracy bent on controlling people’s lives via the Internet. Granted, this film came out just when the Internet was starting out and for this reason there are many out-dated assumptions about what the Internet can and cannot do.

This aside, what interested me in this film is the over-projected claim that our lives are wholly determined by digital information. That is, most of us do our banking online, we buy things from amazon.com and other various sites. Nearly all of our personal information, SIN number, credit card, etc, etc exists online. This is the fear that propels The Net, the fear that our lives could be absolutely controlled by external manipulation.

I realize that we have viruses, and identity theft and so on, but we have also been able to account and prevent these problems using the very technology which creates them. Yet, what is the film trying to say? Identity theft aside, isn’t the film preying on our insecurities and fears about technology within the social setting? This makes me think of the hype about iPhones, how some are saying that sooner or later our whole lives will be dependant on one small piece of technology. Is this a correct hypothesis, or are we merely repeating the fear found in The Net?

Daniel

The Internet truly is a terrifying place. In my humble opinion, however, it has little to do with the amount of cyber crime and quite a bit to do with the depraved minds of its users. Something about this wonderful anonymity has allowed for unspeakable horrors if you go looking hard enough. In fact, most of the time, you simply stumble on some grotesque abomination. Today Angela would be more concerned about accidently stumbling onto 4chan as opposed to a secret plot to take over the world.
The Net does present us with another conundrum about the nature of identity. After stumbling upon the secret of the Praetorians, Devlin goes out of his way to steal Angela’s life and manufacture a new one.

While this seems far-fetched, it seems to work because Angela is a bit of an antisocial recluse (like most computer geeks). As it turns out, there is actually nobody in her life that would recognize her besides her asshole ex-boyfriend. However, a person does need to leave her house at some point. It is a bit disconcerting that none of her neighbours, or even her landlord can remember what she looks like.

More importantly it ultimately raises the question about what it is that makes a person unique. The film seems to suggest that we define ourselves by our interactions with other people. By stripping away those relationships, we are left with a self image that may even be surprising to ourselves.

Borna

I agree with you about the lack of recognition by her neighbors. The film seems to suggest that we have gotten to a point in Western culture, where if we live a virtual life, then our actual, real life will cease to exist. This seems to be what happens to Angela in the film. She essentially lives her life on ‘the net,’ and so even her next door neighbour does not recognize her. The utter stupidity of this aside, it has a meaning. This has to do with the film’s assumption that computer data (via the Internet) will have the last say. In one scene of the film, Angela goes to check out from her hotel, and the hotel database says she has already checked out.

Angela tries to argue with the hotel clerk and explain to him that she has not checked out, yet the clerk insists that the information on the computer is correct and final. This is rather, well, stupid. Or even out-dated. This depends on the presumption that computer information is never falsifiable, and always right, no matter what the situation. When Angela’s identity is stolen and she is given a new one, it is all done over the Internet. Again, no one takes her word for the information that is available on his or her computer screen.

This strange elevation of computer information over everything else is key in the film, yet it just goes to show how out-dated the film truly is. Today, we know that the information on computers can be false, altered and hacked.

Daniel

What seems truly odd to me is this attitude of blind trust. I don’t know anybody that simply goes along with what anybody says, even when that somebody isn’t a new and largely untested piece of technology.  Even so, we now know that identity theft is largely used to steal credit card numbers and buy all sorts of cool shit without having to pay for it.

Besides having this entire plot about the evils of modern technology, The Net also seems to have a subtext of tolerance. In what has to be one of the most bizarre subplots ever, the entire film has an “AIDS is not so bad” feel to it that you often see in afterschool specials from the early nineties. At the beginning of the film a powerful government figure takes his own life because he is homophobic and is led to believe that he has HIV. Later, Angela is able to escape from Devlin by running through a candlelight vigil for AIDS victims. Coupled with the main plotline this seems to suggest the message that the sufferers of the virus are still people, even though their identities are largely anonymous to us.

Borna

Certainly the AIDS message is very strange. Angela, trying to run away from Devlin, not only runs through the vigil, but she runs against the grain. What could this mean? Is the subliminal message of this scene that sometimes we have to stray away from conforming to social norms (i.e. public vigils) in order to unravel the greater truth (i.e. government conspiracy)? What is also interesting is the not-so subtle binary play on good vs. evil. The protagonist, Angela (i.e. Angels, God, Heaven, etc) must run away and fight Devlin (i.e. Devil, Satan, Hell, Evil, etc).

This rather lame and poor use of good and evil just goes further perpetuate the film’s commitment to the idea that technology is evil. Devlin seems to have connections everywhere, even in the FBI, whereas Angela’s own mother cannot even recognize her (thanks to the plot device of Alzheimer’s at the beginning of the movie). For once, I’d like to see a conspiracy film where the binary of good versus evil wasn’t so... well… evident. Why not throw in some grey characters? In the words of Nietzsche, "why not go beyond Good and Evil?"

Daniel

Grey characters? What kind of movie do you think this is? One that is complex and makes any lick of sense whatsoever? If there were any characters that had any streaks of grey whatsoever, we the viewing audience might get confused and be unable to tell who we should be rooting for. The Net makes it really simple for all of us. The big corporation that is attempting to take over the world using the internet is evil. The innocent hacker who is a bit isolated from the rest of society is good.

I think that at its core The Net isn’t just a conspiracy film warning us all about the dangers of new technology. It is a conspiracy film warning us all about the dangers of corporations.

Lessons Learned

• Corporations are evil and trying to take over the world.

• Social interaction will keep you from being erased from the world.

• Chat rooms can lead to anonymous sex with hitmen and identity theft.

• People who have AIDS should be accepted for who they are.

• Identity is more than just our interactions with other people.

• Never trust a guy named Devlin.