'Steve Jobs' finally brings something new to the biopic

Steve Jobs

The underwhelming box office performance of the new film Steve Jobs is surprising for a number of reasons. It's got a top-notch cast, headlined by rising star Michael Fassbender. It's got a popular director (Slumdog Millionaire's Danny Boyle). It's getting excellent reviews, Oscar buzz and its subject matter is an enigmatic and mysterious modern-day legend.

And yet the film has pretty much tanked. I think it's too good to be ignored come Oscar time, but audiences aren't interested in it.

Why? My hunch is that they think this is just another biopic -- a genre that has grown incredibly tired and predictable. The unfortunate thing is that they're wrong.

What Boyle and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin have done here is make a story we think we already know seem fresh and exciting. They accomplish this feat to a certain extent with fluid camera movement and a highly literate screenplay, but also through old fashioned terrific acting and sharp, focused pace.

Michael Fassbender delivers my favorite leading male performance I've seen so far this year as the self-described "poorly made" Steve Jobs. He does a flawless American accent and manages to make a relentless control freak and egomaniac seem both vulnerable and charming. This is not a flattering portrayal of Jobs but it isn't the indictment that Sorkin's The Social Network was of Facebook guru Mark Zuckerberg.

He is surrounded by a supporting cast at the top of their game -- Jeff Daniels, Kate Winslet and a surprisingly compelling Seth Rogen -- as the film hurtles from one major product launch to the next.

It's a risky film, almost a throwback to the days when plays were translated to film more often. The action is in the dialogue and it's a high wire act totally dependent on the actors' ability to sell the material, which they do with aplomb.

But the best thing about the structure of Steve Jobs is that it sidesteps the traditional beats and cliches of the biopic genre. A great comparison would be the blockbuster Straight Outta Compton. The first half of that movie is a real romp, exciting and illuminating, but then then the movie descends into a Cliff Notes version of history, where every major demarcation point (fights, deaths, make-ups) is covered in exhausting fashion.

Steve Jobs doesn't delve into the illness that eventually took the Apple CEO's life, it doesn't show a single scene from his childhood (although there are some interesting references to the fact that he was adopted). The movie isn't trying to portray the entirety of a life, it's just giving you an interpretation of a man at the peak of his powers.

It's definitely not going to be for everyone's tastes. Like all Sorkin-scripted films, it's very talky and the dialogue requires the audience to keep up and pay attention, this is not a movie that gets spoonfed to you. It's also a pretty unflattering portrait of Jobs, so much so that it might alienate audiences who have come to revere the late impresario.

Still, I think Steve Jobs ranks among the better films I've seen this year. It's been an intriguing year for movies; besides Mad Max: Fury Road, I haven't seen many game-changers -- but plenty of solid doubles and triples.