Startup.com (2001)

Directors:

Chris Hegedus
Jehane Noujaim

Release Date:

25 May 2001 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary

Tagline:

The rise and fall of the American dream.

Plot:

Traces the birth and failure of new media company govWorks.com.

Plot Keywords:

Business Deal | Business Failure | Business Manager | Businessmen | Business

Awards:

9 wins & 3 nominations

Cast

Kaleil Isaza Tuzman	...	Himself
Tom Herman	...	Himself
Kenneth Austin	...	Himself
Tricia Burke	...	Herself
Roy Burston	...	Himself
David Camp	...	Himself
José Feliciano	...	Himself
Dora Glottman	...	Herself
Julian Herbstein	...	Himself
Christina Ortez	...	Herself
Jonathan Angus	...	Himself
Chieh Cheung	...	Himself
Sean Coar	...	Himself
Ambika Conroy	...	Herself
Patrick Cromer	...	Himself

MPAA:

Rated R for language.

Runtime:

107 min | Argentina:105 min (Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Argentina:13 | Germany:o.Al. | UK:15 | USA:R | Australia:M

Filming Locations:

Highland Capital Partners - Two International Place, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Company:

Noujaim Films

Trivia:

"The Competitor" who is donning the govWorks.com cap, Bryan R. Mundy of ezGov.com, died in a house fire six days before the movie premiered at Sundance.

Soundtrack:

Sofa Rockers

Standout documentary on business, friendship, and trust

This is one of the most compelling and heart-wrenching films of the new millennium. The real-life struggle of two men trying to capitalize on the "Internet Boom" shows how mistaken everyone was that the Internet was the premiere way to get rich quickly and live happily ever after. But aside from the expose that formulating and operating an Internet business is far less glamorous than potential dollar signs would have one to believe, "Startup.com" is a perfect example of how the lure of riches and the good life can leave behind friendships made along the way; greed demoralizes oneself for the sake of material ownership that may ultimately cease and desist anyway. Filled with many subtleties and slight flourishes of (in)humanity, and telling signs of deteriorating personal relationships on the road to obtaining power and capital, this film contains far more juicy, resonating-with-truth moments than one could find (or even believe) in fiction. Perhaps most importantly, one realizes that with every little company with a numerical representation that he sees in the trade market one day that then disappears the next, there are real people like Kaleil and Tom whose lives are at stake and whom are suffering from the harsh reality that in the "real world," the American dream does not always come to fruition. Final Grade: A