Plot

A woman lands a dream job at a powerful tech company called the Circle, only to uncover an agenda that will affect the lives of all of humanity.

When Mae is hired to work for the world's largest and most powerful tech and social media company, she sees it as an opportunity of a lifetime. As she rises through the ranks, she is encouraged by the company's founder, Eamon Bailey, to engage in a groundbreaking experiment that pushes the boundaries of privacy, ethics and ultimately her personal freedom. Her participation in the experiment, and every decision she makes, begin to affect the lives and future of her friends, family and that of humanity.

Mae Holland is a recent college graduate who lands a job at a next generation tech company known as The Circle. She starts off work in the customer service department but after an incident is invited to meet Eamon Bailey, the head of The Circle. This meeting starts a new chapter for Mae, one which gives her more insight into the powerful internet corporation seeking to revolutionize the entire world.—Viir khubchandani

When her car breaks down, Mae Holland contacts an old acquaintance, Mercer, who is liked by her parents: Vinnie - Mae's father - has multiple sclerosis and needs the help of his wife, Bonnie. Mae's friend Annie Allerton works at The Circle, a tech company where Mae gets a job in Customer Experience. At a company meeting, Eamon Bailey (The Circle's CEO) introduces SeeChange, which uses small cameras placed anywhere to provide real-time video. At work, Mae rises in The Circle, embracing social networking. At a further company presentation emphasizing the need for accountability in politics, The Circle's Chief Operating Officer (COO), Tom Stenton, introduces a political candidate who has agreed to open her daily workings to the public through Circle..

Through her friend Annie (Karen Gillan), call center intern Mae Holland (Emma Watson) secures a customer support position at The Circle, a tech and social media company (after a tough interview with Dan (Nate Corddry) focused on behavioral questions designed to test her attitude). Jared (Mamoudou Athie) manages the unit in which Mae starts. Mae's satisfaction scores are in the mid 90's and she is worried that she will get fired, but Annie tells her it takes a few weeks to get the hang of the job.

Mae's longtime friend Mercer (Ellar Coltrane) is less supportive. He has a secret crush on Mae but has never admitted his feelings to her. Mae takes the job, hoping to support her parents (father Vinnie Holland (Bill Paxton) & Mother Bonnie Holland (Glenne Headly)), particularly her father who suffers from multiple sclerosis & needs $40k for a treatment.

At a company meeting, CEO Eamon Bailey (Tom Hanks) introduces SeeChange, which uses small cameras placed anywhere to provide real-time high-quality video, which also provide real time Analytics & facial recognition, and which can help serve customers a lot better. Eamon also outlines other use cases as bringing the terrorists and the tyrants into the spotlight and not leaving a place for them to hide. If it happens, we will know.

Senator Williamson (Eve Gordon) launches an investigation into possible anti-trust violation at the circle. Mae rises quickly in The Circle, embracing social networking (she has to integrate all her social media accounts with her work profile, as per company policy. The company knew that after clocking out on Friday night, she only returned to office on Monday morning while hundreds of optional activities were organized in the office campus over the weekend. They even knew about her dad's multiple sclerosis. the company network assigns a participation rank to each employee as well) and meeting Ty Lafitte (John Boyega) (the founding father of the company), who displays suspicion of other, more enthusiastic employees. Mae is also given a sensor to ingest and a tracking band on wrist to collect all her vitals.

Due to spending all her time at the office campus, Mae neglects home and finds out that his dad fell one day and only Mercer was around to help. Annie helps to get Mae's parents on the company health plan. She learns that Circle is implanting chips in kids bones to save them from kidnapping, rape and murder.

At an outdoor company rally emphasizing the need for accountability in politics, The Circle's Chief Operating Officer, Tom Stenton (Patton Oswalt), introduces Congresswoman Olivia Santos (Judy Reyes), who has agreed to open her daily workings to the public through SeeChange. Tom reveals at a company meeting that Senator Williams is under FBI investigation, indicating that data provided by the SeeChange had something to do with it.

Ty subsequently shows Mae the area containing the cloud server where all information collected by SeeChange is to be stored. Mae is embarrassed when she realizes that Ty is the creator of TrueYou, the Circle's social network, and she had not recognized him. He tells her that TrueYou has grown out of his control, and its current utilization is not what he intended. Ty says Circle is collecting and storing all of the data and is moving to monetize it.

Later, Mae's mother shows Mae a picture of a chandelier Mercer made from deer antlers. She photographs it and shares it on her Circle profile. The image attracts significant negative attention to Mercer, with people accusing him of killing the deer. Mercer confronts her at work and tells her to leave him alone. Mercer tells Mae to think of the last time she left the office campus. Distressed by Mercer's reaction, Mae goes kayaking at night and the rough waters cause her kayak to capsize, requiring rescue by the Coast Guard, who were alerted to the emergency through SeeChange cameras, which recorded her acquiring the kayak and capsizing it.

At the next company meeting, Eamon introduces Mae to the crowd, and they discuss her experience of the rescue, which moves her to become the first "Circler" to go "completely transparent", which involves wearing a small camera and exposing her life to the world 24 hours a day. However, this damages her relationships with her parents and Annie, as she accidentally exposes private aspects of their lives (She watches her parents having sex) (Annie is jealous of Mae's popularity. Mae corners Annie in the bathroom and thinks she has 3 mins to bathroom time without the video. Annie reveals that Tom is angry with her for questioning him about the Senator Williamson thing. Her job is on the line) to the camera, and they distance themselves from her as a result.

At a board meeting, Eamon announces support from almost all 50 states for voting through Circle accounts (83% of Americans already have Circle accounts). Mae takes it a step further and suggests requiring every voting citizen to have a Circle account in order to do so. She suggests bringing all Govt services under the ambit of the Circle account of the users. Eamon and Tom approve (as it will save the Govt hundreds of billions of dollars), but the suggestion upsets Annie. At the next company-wide meeting, Mae says that The Circle believes it can find anyone on the planet in under 20 minutes and introduces a program to find wanted felons in the same time frame.

The program identifies an escaped child murderer within 10 minutes, which prompts the Circlers in the audience to erupt in applause. Mae uses this successful test to suggest transparency can be a force for good. Mae says that the program can find anyone, not just wanted felons, and someone suggests Mercer. Mae is initially hesitant to use the program to locate Mercer, but Tom persuades Mae to continue. Mercer is quickly located in an isolated cabin. Startled by Circle users descending upon his home, he flees in a car, though a Circle user places a small camera on his car window without his knowledge or consent. They pursue him via automobile and a flying drone, which causes Mercer to swerve uncontrollably off a bridge to his death, much to Mae's horror. Days later, Mae calls Annie, who has left The Circle and returned to Scotland, which has improved her well-being. Mae, however, finds that connection with others helps her cope with Mercer's death.

Mae returns to The Circle, despite her parents' pleas. Mae calls Ty to ask for a favor and Ty tells her something that he has discovered. At the next company-wide meeting, Mae explains how connection has helped her recover. She speaks with Eamon, and invites Tom onstage, then invites Eamon and Tom to go fully transparent. She explains that Ty has found all their email accounts and exposed them to the world, as no one should be exempt. Eamon and Tom, clearly upset, try to save face before Tom leaves the stage. Her superiors cut power to her presentation, and the stage goes dark, but the audience activates their mobile devices, illuminating Mae, who reiterates her advocacy of transparency. She later returns to kayaking, untroubled by the drones that shadow her.