Don't expect a biopic: 'BlackBerry' filmmakers on walking a line of fact and fiction
CTV
When the Canadian filmmakers behind 'BlackBerry' set out to make a feature-length movie about the beloved smartphone's meteoric rise and fall, they weren't necessarily interested in getting all the facts right.
When the Canadian filmmakers behind "BlackBerry" set out to make a feature-length movie about the beloved smartphone's meteoric rise and fall, they weren't necessarily interested in getting all the facts right.
Even though their project was named after the Waterloo, Ont., invention that forever changed how we communicate, both the director and co-writer say they were less interested in the device itself than the story of the three men who grew a pocket-sized idea into a gargantuan success.
Director and co-writer Matt Johnson said, unlike other major technology companies that have dominated the conversation in recent years, BlackBerry's history hasn't been told in documentaries or TV miniseries.
The absence of a familiar narrative gave him and his team a "blank slate" to draft their own versions of former co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie.
"We got to get there first in terms of saying who they really were without there being a whole bunch of baggage," Johnson explained in a video chat from Germany where "BlackBerry" premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival last month to positive reviews.
At its heart, "BlackBerry" is a satire that draws on the impossibility of endless growth, the way success can blind us and the quirks of tech-bro workplace culture.
It's also fast and loose with many historical details.
