There was a good film somewhere in 'The Circle' that sadly almost never comes out. You couldn't argue with a cast this talented, though there were admittedly reservations about Emma Watson and Ellar Coltrane. And the premise was absolutely fascinating, touching on themes that are relevant today and important.

As a film, 'The Circle' is certainly not awful but it is sad that a film with so much potential frustrates more than it intrigues. It is not a complete waste and there are merits. Most of the cast do fare well. The best performance comes from Bill Paxton, moving doesn't describe adequately his heart-breaking turn as Mae's multiple sclerosis-riddled father, a more physical role than verbal in showing the latter stages of MS and it comes over incredibly realistically. Close behind is a sympathetic Glenne Headly, her mother figure full of maternal warmth and sympathetic sincerity. Unfortunately both died not long after, both sudden and both were and still are very sad losses. They were the only characters that one feels anything for throughout.

Not to say that they are the only good actors. Despite being underused, with the character not featuring in the film for a quite long stretch, Tom Hanks makes a valiant effort and brings a lot of much needed charisma and energy whenever he appears. Patton Oswalt is similarly good and Karen Gillan is a breath of fresh air in her scenes.

Some of 'The Circle' doesn't look too bad, it's nicely shot with some lovely locations, especially in the otherwise fairly repetitive and pointless kay-acking scenes.

However, although not a detractor of her work, Emma Watson is woefully miscast, and the come and go accent is the least of the performance's problems. She tries far too hard with some very overwrought dialogue delivery, while seeming stiff and ill at ease in the speeches (a far cry from Hanks' delivery of his introductory scene which had me and my sister glued to the screen and on the edge of our seats),her grief doesn't ring true due to a lack of genuine emotion and she came over as too smug, aloof and self-congratulatory at the end. Despite Watson's miscasting, she fares a little better than Ellar Coltrane, found him uneven in 'Boyhood', here he was terrible in one of the most painfully amateurish performances seen recently as a barely-in-it plot device character. John Boyega has nothing to do other than look moody, a waste of a hugely promising rising star.

While there are a few elements of the production values that work, 'The Circle' looks a little too gloomily lit and there is a lack of fluidity in the editing. Don't remember a single note from Danny Elfman's score, which is one of his most generic and eminently forgettable efforts. James Ponsoldt's direction is very slack, which badly affects the never-coming-to-life pacing.

Found a lot of the script stilted, over-complicated (with an overload of technical jargon that confuses and alienates the viewer) and self-indulgent. It also tries to touch on the relevant and important theme of the dangers of media, the internet and technology but instead approaches it in a way that talks down to the viewer and uncomfortably condescends. Tonally, it's muddled, trying to be a psychological thriller, drama with a George Orwell and '1984' influence, philosophy and workplace coming-of-age drama, and never really succeeds at any of them.

It's just too half-hearted and half-baked in delivery with as aforementioned convoluted and shoe-horned technical jargon. What it tries to say about the theme it addresses is nothing new or enlightening and has the subtlety of a sledgehammer. The philosophical elements are far too simplistic and the workplace/coming-of-age scenes are too few and almost irrelevant.

Unfortunately, it fares just as badly in the story. It's often incredibly dull and repetitive with a fairly incoherent beginning before Hanks shows up. The whole totalitarian and evil intentions of the tech company are blatantly obvious too early and beaten around the viewer's heads, their actions (especially the finding people in 20 minutes or less) are highly improbable too. The death scene was poorly edited, cheap, hollow and manipulative and the climax seemed to contradict the film's dangerous and unsubtle messaging. Only the scenes with the parents have any emotion or ring true, wish there was more of them.

Overall, a missed opportunity that could have been good if executed right. 4/10 Bethany Cox

Mae Holland (Emma Watson) gets a customer service job at the social tech company The Circle with help from childhood friend Annie (Karen Gillan). Her best friend Mercer hates modern social media. Her father (Bill Paxton) struggles with MS and her mother (Glenne Headly) struggles with medical insurance. The Circle is run by the charismatic leader Eamon Bailey (Tom Hanks). Ty Lafitte (John Boyega) is a mysterious non-conformist in the open-interconnected company.

This is rather heavy-handed in the subject matter. It's fine to expand on the senator but she's only a way-station. Mae takes a turn that is unfair. There is a climatic incident that is beyond manufactured. It tries to be a big-subject movie but it gets overwhelmed by it. It needs to pick a smaller target to extrapolate on the bigger issue.

I must say I am pretty surprised by the bad reception this film received mostly, but first things first. "The Circle" is an American English-language film from 2017, so a new release we got here and the writer and director is James Ponsoldt, who has some films in his body of work that are really good like "Smashed" one of my very favorite films from 2012. And while this 2-hour film here is not as good, it still made for a pretty decent watch overall. It starts slightly weak, but quickly gets better by the minute. Lead actress is Emma Watson and while she may not be as great of an actress as her looks are, she is still pretty talented. You will see more familiar faces like Tom Hanks of course and also a special mention to Patton Oswalt who may not have a lot to work with here, but definitely made the most of it and created a fairly memorable antagonist with his face expressions and body language. Watson is in almost every scene of the movie and carried it nicely all the time. Are there doubts about the realism of her rise? There certainly are. Her catching the camera early on, her rafting accident becoming so special, her being picked to go under (almost) 24/7 surveillance, her constant running into the creator etc. The way she tricked the bad guys at the end was maybe not too realistic either, but tolerable, reminded me a bit of "The Wave". I liked the way how she lured Oswalt's character to the stage, even if it is hard to believe he was in charge of all the light and electricity there etc. Still makes him even more special somehow.

Anyway, even if you cannot call it the most realistic film of the year 2017, it is still damn entertaining and also brings a message that is worth sharing. I am not talking about the idea that surveillance is bad. I am talking about the idea that you may want to communicate with other people in person. I liked the scene early on, in which the protagonist says she will text the young male character when to meet again instead of simply deciding right away. The ways in which the parents were included worked nicely as well and gave this film interesting supporting characters too. But while the treatment for them, the comments about avoiding rape and murder and the ways in which criminals can be located quickly may seem like positive aspects to some extent, the film takes sides against the cause of these developments from the very start. The Circle are the bad guys (from the job interview on),Coltrane is the good guy, but Watson's character has a long way to go before she realizes. The more fans and followers she gains, the more her personal relationships turn into a mess. I liked about the film that Watson is never shown as power-hungry or anything, just enjoying the attention, even if the situation spirals out of control more and more, eventually with deadly consequences. And I also liked that the bad guys were not depicted as Nazis or some cult or religious group or anything. It was really all about business, greedy businessmen at the top of it, who don't believe in their project, but believe in the money they make with it.

There are a couple other minor struggles I had with the film like that it could have ended with them heading out of the auditorium right away, but I guess they wanted Watson right in the middle of it on her own, so they included a bit of an epilogue eventually. I haven't read the book this one is based on, but judging merely the movie I enjoyed it for the most part. It's no best of the year material and it will probably not get that much awards recognition overall, but that's alright. It's far from the failure some make it out to be. As for people criticizing the age of the creator, look at Zuckerberg when he launched his empire. And it also feels real that the businessmen would take over selling the initially interesting concept with their charisma (Hanks) and turning it into an abomination. Another thing I liked were the chat comments by the viewers that were truly spot-on. On a more negative note, the film is a bit jumpy. We have the election reference, we have all these camera references and then in the end there is something about car safety and there were really no transitions or elaborations on the previous projects anymore. Not a perfect film, but I was still close to giving it an even higher rating than the three stars out of five that I eventually settle with. Definitely recommend the watch.