It’s hard to remember now, but there was a time when we were not tethered to our smart phones. A new film, “BlackBerry,” starring Jay Baruchel and Matt Johnson, and now playing in theatres, vividly recreates the scrappy story of friendship, betrayal and hubris that began our obsession with our phones.
Baruchel and Johnson play Mike Lazaridis and Doug Fregin, founders of small tech company Research in Motion. When we first meet them it’s 1996 and they are about to pitch a new kind of pager to hotheaded executive Jim Balsillie (Glenn Howerton). He’s the kind of Art of War-style boss who snaps at an assistant who reaches for a bottle of water. “Thirst is a display of weakness.”
Too busy trying to backstab his way to the top of the corporate ladder to give the tech nerds his attention, he dismisses the awkward pitch before they even get to the end. But when his latest grab at a promotion gets him fired from his cushy corporate job, he reaches out to RIM with an offer.
Under his aggressive leadership, coupled with Lazaridis’s uncompromising search for perfection and Fregin’s clever engineering and heart, the Waterloo, Ontario storefront start-up soon debuts “the world’s largest pager.” Or is it “the world’s smallest email terminal?” Either way, it is a handheld game changer that combines a phone with the capabilities of a computer.
The odd little phone, with a QWERTY keyboard, encrypted messaging and low data cost, becomes a status symbol, used by some of the world’ most powerful people. In the hands of everyone from President Barack Obama and Justin Timberlake to Katy Perry and Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour, the phones helped the world communicate in a whole new way.
The halcyon days of BlackBerry lasted a few years until shady business dealings, ambition and lack of vision relegated RIM’s products to the scrap heap; the “phone people had before they bought an iPhone.”
“BlackBerry” isn’t just a business story or the story of innovation. Instead, it is an underdog tale that emphasizes the human foibles that led to RIM’s downfall, not just the financial ones.
Baruchel and Howerton, as the characters who provide the story’s yin and yang, hand in strong performances.
Baruchel, topped with a shock of white hair, goes deep to play Lazaridis as a socially awkward man with a rich inner life, a perfectionist who can’t help himself from fixing a buzz on the office intercom in Balsillie’s office on the day of their big pitch.
As Balsillie, Howerton is all bluster, a thin-skinned man who covers his weaknesses with a thick veneer of bellicosity. From attempting to buy a hockey team after a rival slights the game to his wanton manipulation of RIM to suit his own ambitions, he is simultaneously the best and worst thing that ever happened to Lazaridis and Fregin.
As director and writer (as well as co-star), Johnson concentrates on the human side of the story, amping up the anxiety with a terrific sense of pacing and claustrophobic close-ups of his cast as their lives and business unwind.
“BlackBerry” is an interesting slice of recent history, made all the more interesting by the study of hubris that makes this tech story so human.
It’s hard to remember now, but there was a time when we were not tethered to our smart phones. A new film, “BlackBerry,” starring Jay Baruchel and Matt Johnson, and now playing in theatres, vividly recreates the scrappy story of friendship, betrayal and hubris that began our obsession with our phones.
Today, we going to focus on that story, courtesy of the film BlackBerry, which opens in theatres on May 12.
There was a time when the Canadian made, odd little phone, with a QWERTY keyboard, encrypted messaging and low data cost, was a status symbol, used by some of the world’ most powerful people. In the hands of everyone from President Barack Obama and Justin Timberlake to Katy Perry and Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour, the phones helped the world communicate in a whole new way.
They were the original smart phones, which makes their Canadian creators Mike Lazaridis and Doug Fregin, visionaries, the men who gave us the future.
Recently I sat down with BlackBerry co-writer, co-star and director Matt Johnson, and Jay Baruchel who stars as the awkward genius behind the BlackBerry tech, Mike Lazaridis.
Matt is the director of The Dirties, which won Best Narrative Feature at the Slamdance Film Festival, Operation Avalanche, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and mockumentary television series Nirvanna the Band the Show.
You know Jay from his voice role as Hiccup Haddock in the How to Train Your Dragon franchise, and for roles in Knocked Up, Tropic Thunder, The Trotsky, Fanboys, She’s Out of My League, Goon, This Is the End, and the action-fantasy film The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. You can also see him as the host of We’re All Gonna Die (Even Jay Baruchel) on Crave.
BlackBerry is the story of the company Research in Motion, Jim Balsillie, the hotheaded businessman, played by Glenn Howerton, who was there for the rise and fall of the iconic company.
“BlackBerry” isn’t just a business story or the story of innovation. Instead, it is an underdog tale that emphasizes the human foibles that led to RIM’s downfall, not just the financial ones.
We began the interview with the idea of talking about the film, but were soon sidetracked by a discussion inspired by the lessons learned from the film, about what it means to be Canadian, why we don’t celebrate our own stories and much more. Stay tuned, it often doesn’t sound like an interview as much as a conversation we might have had over a drink or two. Like the movie we were supposed to concentrate on, before the conversation took a few left turns, the interview is passionate, patriotic, funny and not quite what you might expect.
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Lean and mean, the easiest way to describe “Knuckleball,” a new film starring genre legend Michael Ironside, is as a nastier “Home Alone.”
Headed to a funeral, Mary and Paul (Kathleen Munroe and Chenier Hundal) leave their young son Henry (Luca Villacis) in the hands of his grandfather Jacob (Ironside). Deposited on the rural farm Henry is without the essentials of his millennial life, videogames and a working cell phone. Put to work outside, Henry begrudgingly does his chores, shows an ability with a baseball and meets oddball neighbour Dixon (Munro Chambers). Grandpa says he’s “almost like family” but there is something strained between the two men. Henry’s uneasy rural retreat turns to terror when he looks to Dixon for help after he is left alone in Jacob’s house, miles from anywhere with a storm—literally and metaphorically—brewing.
“Knuckleball” is a story of survival pared down to the essentials. The remote setting, the icy atmosphere and Ironside’s menacing presence create a sense of dread that blossom throughout. The cat and mouse story has gaps and some unnecessary twists but the undercurrent of fear, driven by a strong performance from Villacis that is both vulnerable and resourceful, prevails. It’s a story of secrets and cruelty carefully crafted to accentuate the thrills and not the plot holes.
