HOLLYWOOD—The life of the “man of tomorrow,” tech guru and founder of Apple Computers is revealed in the new movie “Jobs” starring Ashton Kutcher as a splitting image of Steve Jobs hit theaters nation-wide on August 16.
The movie has a “Social Network”-like feel rewinding back in time, only with this twenty-something marched the beat of his own drum, a college dropout of Reed College, spent his days living out the psychedelic 70s: getting high, sleeping around, and auditing an occasional class here and there.
Things turn around when Jobs first sets eyes on the brainchild of his friend and computer engineer, Steve Wozniak or “Woz” and his “operating system,” a prototype keyboard connected to a television screen with colorful wires and nobs sticking. It’s his love-at-first-sight with the unexplored technology of the personal computers that inspired Jobs to build his start-up Apple Computers out of his parents’ garage with his crew of misunderstood, misfit friends.
Fame and fortune tear apart Job’s closest relationships and with bosses telling him “Your good, your damn good, but you’re an asshole” earning Job’s the title of number one asshole, screaming at the top of his lungs, and his on-going frenemy relationship with Bill Gates.
A climatic scene in the movie occurs when his long-time friend and co-founder of Apple, Woz enters Jobs’ office finding him on his knees under piles of scattered papers telling him about leaving Apple. “I just wanted to be one of the guys and out of all the guys I knew you were the coolest,” said Woz. It leaves tearful Jobs alone with his thoughts. Throughout the movie, Jobs’ walks around like he had the weight of the computer world on his shoulders, as it becomes heavier and heavier on him throughout the 80s and 90s. Jobs and Apple had their ups-and-downs, from drops in sales, to Jobs leaving Apple. “I never lost it (Apple) it was stolen from me,” said Jobs.
Fast-forward to the late 90s, a black turtleneck, faded Levi Jeans, and Birkenstock wearing fifty-something returns as CEO of Apple Inc. and absorbing the company he lost and turning heads among Apple staff as he walked around the Silicon Valley Campus.
Jobs’ out-of-the-box-thinking became the foundation of Apple Inc. success with the Apple 2, Macintosh Computer, iMac, iPod, and iPhone. The underlying message of the movie was best told by Jobs himself as he hit the radio waves in recruiting the eager young minds of tomorrow at the end of the movie:
“Here’s to the crazy ones — the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things. They push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones, who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do,” said Jobs.
By Alice Perez
