I saw this in July but signed an NDA - since it's premiering today I guess I can post my thoughts:

We were told at the beginning of the screening that this was a work-in-progress without end credits but other than that and some coloring issues this seemed almost entirely finished and I can't really see how it could be edited down. It runs a little over two hours.

The movie itself is classic Sorkin and if you're a fan of his writing I can't see you not getting at least something out of it. The movie really is essentially three 40-minute scenes taking place in 1984, 1988 and 1998 during the launch of Jobs's various products. It starts by throwing you in the middle of the action and never really lets up. I actually really liked the narrative structure of the film - it felt unique and different than a lot of biopics. The relationship between Jobs and his young daughter Lisa is also front and center and where the film really gets its emotional center.

I personally found the opening sequence in 1984 to be the best part of the movie. There's a crackling energy to it that's exciting and almost feels like a thrilling stage play. The 1988 sequences are sensational as well. I found the very end of the film a bit saccharine and safe, but it definitely gives the movie an arc it might not have had otherwise. It's incredibly fast paced and well-edited, and the dialogue is constant - Sorkin's script is sensational and there are some truly riveting sequences here. Danny Boyle's direction is very strong as well and I think he gives the movie more of a heart than it would have had if David Fincher was at the helm.

Michael Fassbender was sensational and really disappears into this role - I forgot I was watching him after a while. He makes Jobs somewhat despicable but also really human and you understand a lot of his motivations. He is equally matched by a nearly unrecognizable Kate Winslet who does some of her finest work in years, and a fantastic Jeff Daniels who has a showdown with Jobs that is one of the highlights of the movie. Katherine Waterston is also great and impressed me a lot more here than in Inherent Vice, and all three young actresses who play Lisa do fine work as well. I found Seth Rogen miscast. He was fine but never once did I see him as anyone other than Seth Rogen - his character is clearly supposed to be Eduardo to Jobs's Mark Zuckerberg but I didn't really buy their friendship and their big scene together isn't as memorable as it should be.

I think this will do well and find an audience though the ending is not going to please cynics. I see awards attention for sure for Fassbender and Sorkin's screenplay, and Kate Winslet and Jeff Daniels also deserve to be in the conversation. The score is also fantastic and deserves special mention. A-

I saw this again last night and appreciated Rogen's performance a lot more. I'd probably bump my grade up to an A. Michael Stuhlbarg also does fantastic work.

The showdown between Jeff Daniels and Michael Fassbender in the "second act" is the high point of the movie. I'll be very disappointed if those two and Winslet fail to score Oscar nods.

Just saw this. It's a very well made film, and Aaron Sorkin does not disappoint with his work here. He has written an illuminating character study of Steve Jobs here, and the work of Danny Boyle elevates the written word into a film full of tension. The decision to shoot each of the three segments of the film in a different format is particularly ingenious, as it helps recreate the feeling of each time period. The performances here are uniformly great. That said, I did feel that the structure of the film combined with Aaron Sorkin's dialogue make the film feel somewhat condensed and maybe even a little too tidy. Also, the way it ends and the musical selection there comes off really cheesy, and it doesn't really work with the tone of the film. I definitely think they should have reconsidered that one. Regardless, Steve Jobs is quite solid and intriguing, giving us a unfaltering look at the mad genius at its center. B+

C, this was nowhere close to the brilliance of The Social Network. starts off promising but gets weaker and weaker each act with a very cringe-inducing final act. Wishes to be Birdman but never succeeds; the self-congratulatory screenplay gives itself too much credit creating false tension out of made-up drama.

even if taken as a fictional film based on fictional characters, the story arc still feels hollow and completely forced; the supporting characters make unconvincing outbursts for no reason than to ham it up (job's outbursts, on the other hand, were fully convincing and in-character)

acting wise, fassbender and winslet were completely masterful in spite of the screenplay, while Daniels was nothing special (inferior performance to The Martian) and Rogen was completely out of his league.

I loved this. I quite enjoyed the structure and Fassbender is really terrific.

People can and will debate...and debate...and debate Steve Jobs the film's fidelity to the arc of its subject's life and the caliber of his character, but it is without a doubt an exciting, vital, and supremely well-acted piece of dialogue- and idea-driven cinema. The story (based on, inspired by, and/or adjacent to reality) firmly adheres to a three-act structure, and each act consists of a single day. On each day, the title entrepreneur and technocrat introduces a new product while contending with industry rivalry and personal crisis, including a strained relationship with an unstable ex-partner and her daughter, a girl he refuses to recognize as his biological daughter. The acting is tremendous. The dialogue delivers confrontational intensity and sharp wit at a rapid-fire pace. And the chic, agitated aesthetic turns what could resemble a filmed play into a hypnotic experience worthy of a big screen. Particularly neat are abrupt transitions from granular, homespun 16-millimeter footage to more lustrous 35 millimeter to, in the end, crystal-clear digital photography; each switch in presentation signals a leap forward in Jobs' life (from the mid-1980s to the late '90s) and in the conceptual and financial viability of his personal-computing products.

A

It's difficult to encapsulate the essence of Steve Jobs's life in a two-hour space (as evidenced by the tepid response to the 2013 biopic and the gargantuan length of the biography upon which this film is based), but Steve Jobs accomplishes the task. While the unconventional three-act approach restricts the vast majority of the narrative to three very specific moments in Jobs's life, the selection of details and the presentation of said details are such that we get a clear and vivid outline of the man's complexities in each snapshot. Even though the film is comprised largely of dialogue, it is an absolutely electrifying experience thanks to three factors: the screenwriting, the acting, and the direction. Although the script does not represent Aaron Sorkin's finest cinematic work (a title that I would still award to The Social Network), it's a more-than-sufficiently-close second. The dialogue is razor-sharp, and while it's not always subtle, it has plenty of bite and never feels even remotely as on-the-nose as Sorkin's disappointing work on The Newsroom. Given the stagey nature of Sorkin's script, it's no wonder that the acting is also excellent across the board. In the title role, Michael Fassbender does some of the best work of an incredibly-promising career thus far. He disappears into the role and embodies both the hubris and vulnerability of Jobs without missing a beat. Fassbender's work is a natural and committed wonder that rivals his revelatory work in Shame and demands the viewer's attention and admiration every step of the way. Kate Winslet is also great as Joanna Hoffman, Jobs's assistant. Winslet is fiery enough to match up with Fassbender is virtually every scene that they share (if not surpass him in several of those scenes), and she brings subtle-but-effective touches of warmth to her interactions with Jobs's daughter that gracefully foreshadow her most Oscar-friendly clip in the third act. After a disappointing post-Oscar resume, Winslet's work here resonates so strongly that it will undoubtedly remind many a viewer of why she was so revered in the years leading up to her Best Actress win for The Reader. Michael Stuhlbarg is also fantastic in what is unfortunately likely to be an overlooked performance as an oft-criticized underling who assumes magnified importance near the end of the film. Stuhlbarg is quietly heartbreaking as a worker whose dedication to Jobs's personal affairs ultimately extends much further than a viewer may initially assume. Katherine Waterston also makes the very most of limited screen time with a performance that is at least as impressive (and doomed to be just as underrated) as her work on Inherent Vice; it's never entirely clear how much of the truth we see from Jobs's jilted lover, but she packs a wallop in each of her scenes. The three actresses who play Jobs's daughter are also uniformly effective in forming the film's emotional backbone; even though Jobs remains reluctant to acknowledge his responsibilities as a father through most of the running time, the connections that each of these young actresses shares with Fassbender allow the film to earn its surprisingly sentimental ending. As easy as it would be to credit the script and the pedigree of the cast, Danny Boyle also shines behind the camera. While the film is not as kinetic as other films in Boyle's oeuvre, he still makes it feel more visually dynamic than one would expect from such a stagey film, and he achieves a level of play-like cinematic intimacy akin to last year's Birdman. All told, Steve Jobs is anything but a conventional biopic, but the approach taken here is one that gives the film a singular feel that meshes perfectly with its creator's insistence on innovation and unconventional thinking. Thus, as befits a film about a man whose unconventional approach finally led to unexpected-but-resounding success, it's a knockout.

A

Well, I loved this. Likely won't make my top 10 for the year, but should fall somewhere in the top 15. Not totally perfect, but I'm an admitted huge fan of Sorkin (the meh-ness of The Newsroom excluding). The film's rat-a-tat pace really worked for me. The idea of dividing the film into three acts, all backstage, was innovative and well-done. Michael Fassbender is phenomenal. I also thought Kate Winslet was really terrific; she conveys the long-suffering thing really well. Jeff Daniels are Seth Rogen are both quite good as well. But this is definitely Fassbender's moment, and it's a fabulous performance. A-

B+/A- (pending repeat viewings)

Quick thoughts:

It was very good. Sorkin has done a great job again and it is more his moie than Boyle's (and so was The Social Network), yet Danny Boyle's direction is distinct enough that he leaves his mark. Fassbender is terrific and maybe even his second-best (Shame remains unbeaten) yet.

That being said - it is just not as good as The Social Network. Maybe it is just that I could not relate to it as much, but The Social Network touched a nerve and tapped into zeitgeist. This one didn't. Also, The Social Network was simply a much better directed and composed film. Score, editing, direction were just pitch-perfect on TSN and complemented Sorkin's script tremendously. I didn't feel that energy with Steve Jobs.

I prefer this to The Social Network. More involving on an emotional level, on a character level, while maintaining the machine-gun dialogue wizardry and thematic weight. Sorkin's Jobs is more nuanced than Sorkin's Zuckerberg.

I would not deny any of that. But The Social Network is still a more engaging film to me overall, more energetic, more lively and it lives well above and beyond Eisenberg's (great) performance as Zuckerberg. It is just a way more masterfully crafted piece of filmmaking.

I was disappointed by how little of Danny Boyle's style is in this film, but still enjoyed it alot. I feel like this project was meant for a Spielberg type, which Danny is able to replicate just fine. Sorkin is hit or miss for me, and luckily this was a hit.

Focusing on Steve's relationships over his genius gives the film a lot more heart than one would expect. And while he is often patronizing and dismissive, Fassbender delivers his lines with a dark sense of humor that keeps Steve from becoming an unlikeable asshole. As if we were hearing the dialogue from his ears, all the realistic crticisms come across as unnecessary nonsense until the product crashes as expected. I think Bale would have been too mean to achieve this effect, and Jobs would come off as villian adjace, like Eisenberg's Zuckerberg. I didn't feel any real sympthy towards anyone other than Lisa, and I think it is better that way. His relationship with her is the highlight of the film. At one point he says something like "I know you're hearing me but it's like I'm not saying into" . A lesser film would add a quip from Lisa aling the lines of "I wonder where I get that from" but Steve Jobs doesn't need because it's obvious. His father-like relationship with Daniel's is also great, moving from sweet to bitter to intense and then back to warm. I wasn't a big fan of how much forces closure the third act gave, but burying the hatchet with Jeff Daniels worked.

Kate Winslet provides some great emotional work. However, I was bothered by her accent constantly changing. There was a point in the second act where she switched to a Spanish accent and I thought it was a different character entirely. And Seth Rogen is as vanilla as possible playing Woz. However, Woz really doesn't need to be in the film at all. All three of his scenes are basically the same. The last one is highly unnecesary, and makes Woz look like a bitter old man, rather than a neglected best friend.

Steve Jobs is great through 2/3rds, but can't sustain the momentum to make it a classic film. So I guess it did capture some essence of Danny Boyle after, just his worst trait lol.

I loved it. This is the favorite work I've seen from Sorkin, the dialog was endlessly entertaining and every character was given time to shine, along with the artist theme. Danny Boyle lets the screenplay be the star but the look and feel of the film plays a key role and the flashbacks were edited in EXCELLENTLY, peaking in the Scully-Jobs scene. What I wasn't expecting is for Fassbender to be this great. Fassbender in his other performances up to this point has usually come off as the same intense guy and I was half expecting the same, but here there is a levity to Jobs I wasn't expecting that made it different feel like a different man than the other Fassbender roles, and whatever voice modifications he made were perfect. Kate Winslet will also be a deserving Supporting Actress nominee and possible winner playing the reserved role off Jobs perfectly and then nailing her Oscar scene. I really liked the Jobs-Joanna relationship. Really though there wasn't a character in the film I didn't enjoy. Lisa and Chrisann, Woz, Scully, Andy, etc. They all their moments in the script and performances.

Yeah, this was pretty great and it's disappointing that it never found an audience. Fassbender and Winslet were both fantastic and very much worthy to be in the Oscar discussion this year. The script was fantastic and it was very fast paced. It falters a bit in the end a bit but everything before that was seriously great.

A-

the difference between this and the social network is emblematic of the differences between boyle and fincher - both great, but in their own ways.

Steve Jobs

Superbly crafted, brisk, and well-acted, but devoid of any reason for me to invest. Jobs hands his daughter a folded piece of paper with a paint drawing then walks out to launch the iMac. This, supposedly, is meant to have great emotional impact. I couldn't have given less shits. Fassbender is a tremendous actor, Boyle is a slick technician, and Steve Jobs was an asshole. Those are my 'take-homes' from Steve Jobs. The film simply didn't interest me.

C+

Film I compare it with the most J. Edgar. Putting a great actor together with a great director doesn't mean a great film. The cast really is good in this, but I don't see Boyle's hand in this at all. The only scene I liked was when he talked with Winslet in the hallway, when the missile was launched. It was almost quite bad, but the really good performances from everyone make it still bearable to watch.

C

This movie is actually very entertaining and involving despite the entire thing being dialogue. I thought it was much better than The Social Network, which was good but slow in points. This never lets up. The only real issue I have is it's unclear what the point of the film is. Because how I felt at the end was "Steve Jobs was a real asshole, wasn't he? Learn something new everyday." If there was a deeper meaning I missed, the film failed to be anything other than entertaining, though you certainly feel you know Steve Jobs after it's over.

B+

I loved this movie. Might be the best movie of 2015 for me. The entire cast is great specially Fassbender and Winslet.

9/10 [A+]

how is 9/10 an A+?

What do you guys give 9/10? A? Because I don't think any movie will ever get an A+ for me.

10/10 is an A+

I mean, 9/10 could be an A+... but then what would a 10/10 be?

You JUST gave a film an A+.