Big Picture Big Sound

A Beautiful Bind

One can be forgiven for presuming that any new movie concerning technology and starring Jesse Eisenberg is going to play like an inevitable follow-up to - or worse, a carbon copy of - 2010's "The Social Network." New tech drama "The Hummingbird Project" certainly shares some DNA with the unlikely Facebook-focused blockbuster, in that it concerns another technological arms race: here, the battle to best the financial markets with souped-up electronic trading systems.

But where "The Social Network" ambitiously used the Facebook origin tale to comment on the greater impact of its development on our social evolution, "Hummingbird" chooses a narrower scope. Rather than exploring the fight over high-speed data relay construction as a historical development, this surprisingly reflective tech-thriller frames it as a hero's journey, a "man against the elements" cliffhanger. While this approach reduces the weight of the film, it also makes it more compelling.

Restless schemer Vincent (Jesse Eisenberg, "Now You See Me 2") has his sights set on a million-dollar idea that will take him out of the humdrum of his daily work behind the scenes at an investment firm and put him on the fast-track to riches: a completely straight, all-geographical-hurdles-be-damned data relay line that will speed up information exchange enough to enable lucky users to leapfrog over other stock traders and theoretically reap fabulous profits in the process. Vincent enlists his brainy and awkward cousin Anton (Alexander Skarsgard, True Blood), who's a fitfully passionate savant when it comes to technology - in an early scene he shouts down a stubborn co-worker over the issue of neutrino messaging vs. microwave transmission - and together they walk out on their uber-ambitious boss Eva (Salma Hayek, "The Hitman's Bodyguard") to pursue their against-the-odds venture. It turns out to be much, much more difficult than they could possibly imagine.

One failing of "The Hummingbird Project" is that it's dealing with a complicated topic, but it isn't until halfway through the film that we get a solid layman's explanation of the theory behind the scheme and can finally synthesize all of the efforts that we've been witness to in the first half of the story. Still, that lack of full immersion doesn't keep the story from being engaging. Watching Vincent hurl himself at every obstacle, first with smug confidence, then hucksterish persistence, and finally with the tumult of a man who's been pushed over the edge, makes for an absorbing character study. It's initially unclear if Mr. Eisenberg can convey the emotional arc - he seems more given to glassy, guarded performances than onscreen introspection - but as circumstances shift we see a more relatable character emerge, and by the end can grasp the universality of his story.

And that story contains some bewildering stumbling blocks. In trying to run a communication line straight - yes, literally straight - from an origin site in Kansas to the stock exchange in New York City, Vincent and his project manager Mark (Michael Mando, "Spider-Man: Homecoming") find themselves contending with the foibles of human nature (suspicious landowners, and drilling crews that suddenly pull up stakes at the prospect of a bigger payday) and - well, nature-nature (how to run a line through mountains, across rivers, and into protected federal lands). "The Hummingbird Project" repeats the same pattern again and again of presenting an obstacle, explicating the utter impossibility of overcoming it, and then brainstorming a workable solution. Surprisingly, there's something strangely soothing about watching others pull themselves figuratively hand-over-hand up the sheer side of a massive, insurmountable problem set, regardless of the ultimate outcome.

"The Hummingbird Project" features some unexpectedly striking cinematography as Vincent treks into ever more remote locations to keep tabs on the crews who are hard at work conquering the wilderness at his behest. In contrast, cousin Anton is sequestered in a Midwestern hotel room, wrestling with the technological obstacles that threaten to upend their entire venture. As the intently focused Anton, Alexander Skarsgard ventures well outside his typical territory of handsome, brooding leading man, and "Hummingbird" lets him play it bald and bespectacled to boot. He presents a believable portrait of a frustrated creative thinker who just wants the world to leave him alone to laboriously untie his latest set of mental knots.

In the end, "The Hummingbird Project" isn't telling a world-changing story, but it's consistently engaging, occasionally challenging, and will leave you knowing more than you did when the opening credits rolled. It may also convince you that the shortest distance between two points isn't always a straight line.