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Blackberry is quite possibly one of the best films of the year, even for someone who never had one, but whose favourite mobile phones were the T-Mobile G1 and G2 (also known as the HTC Desire Z in the UK), both of which had physical keyboards.
At the head of Research in Motion, nerdy Mike Lazaridis (Jay Baruchel – FUBAR) and best friend and co-founder and slob Doug Fregin (Matt Johnson) have the idea to put a computer inside a phone, which they bring to the attention of businessman – and completely non-technical – Jim Balsillie (Glenn Howerton), with the latter eventually making them an offer to leave his current job, to join them as CEO, because he believes their new device will kick off the smartphone market.
As a slight irritant at this point, annoyingly, the film doesn’t tell us the year we’re in until after the opening credits, but at least, it does keep us relatively updated after that. For reference, we begin in 1996, the blistering music coming from the speakers beginning with Elastica’s Connection.
Ideally, the trio should be a dream team, since Jim deduces that US Robotics are completely screwing Mike and Doug on an existing modem manufacturing deal, placing an order and then not paying for it, but in order to beat the competition and win at ‘the next big thing’, they to build a prototype of what later becomes the blackberry.
Everyone is brilliant in this, firstly Jay Baruchel, as Mike, who accepts no slacking in creation, even spotting that Jim’s intercom in his original job has a defect which causes a strange buzzing noise and needs a simple fix; director and co-writer Matt Johnson as Doug, who dresses like John McEnroe and treats everything like a big joke, doing as little work as possible – basically flying on a wing and a prayer; and Glenn Howerton is a powerhouse as Jim. I haven’t seen him before, but even within five minutes of him appearing, I was frightened of him… far more scary than Saw X!
From then on, and over the years that follow, we see the rise of the Blackberry – along with various obstacles to overcome, such as their biggest competitor to come, the moment in 2007 when Steve Jobs announces the iPhone, which just has a screen… even though, I actually preferred a keyboard!
There’s brilliant acting, direction and writing – sometimes with very technical dialogue, as well as lots of humour. And to top it off, Michael Ironside (X-Men: First Class) plays Charles Purdy, brought in as their COO (Chief Operating Officer), who introduces himself to the team by barking at them, telling them if they don’t want to do any work, they’ll get fired, instead.
There’s also welcome support from Martin Donovan (Tenet) as Rick Brock, who we initially see as Jim’s boss, and Saul Rubinek (True Romance) as John Woodman, to whom (and his team) ideas for the Blackberry and variants are being pitched.
It’s such a shame that this is largely being ignored in the cinema, since after just one week, it has a single screening on weekdays, and nothing at the weekend. However, hopefully, home formats and streaming services will boost this over time, because it really deserves it, and with just a $5m budget, it deserves to recoup that many times over.
To that end, I read that an extended version of the film will air in a three-part miniseries on CBC on November 9th, with additional footage. Can’t wait!
As an aside, there was an annoying couple in the row behind me, a few seats to my right. At one point, the female half put her shoes up on the seat in front of her (something Odeon normally deals with, since they actually have CCTV in there, unlike Cineworld), and since I’d brought in some home-made tuna fish sandwiches with me, I lobbed the empty plastic wrapper onto the seat directly in front of them… About 10-15 minutes later, they upped sticks and moved to the back of the cinema!
I didn’t think my sandwiches were that strong, although they did have a chatty couple sat behind them, so that may have influenced their decision. I’ll never know…
Blackberry is in cinemas now, and is available to pre-order on Amazon Prime.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 120 minutes
Release date: October 6th 2023
Studio: IFC Films
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Cinema: Odeon Trafford Centre
Rating: 9/10
Director: Matt Johnson
Producers: Fraser Ash, Niv Fichman, Kevin Krikst, Matthew Miller
Novel: Jacquie McNish, Sean Silcoff (“Losing the Signal”)
Screenplay: Matt Johnson, Matthew Miller
Music: Jay McCarrol
Cast:
Mike Lazaridis: Jay Baruchel
Douglas Fregin: Matt Johnson
Jim Balsillie: Glenn Howerton
Charles Purdy: Michael Ironside
Jasmine: Kelly Van der Burg
Shelly: Laura Cilevitz
Rick Brock: Martin Donovan
Callaghan Drummond: James Elliot Miniou
Derek: Fuad Musayev
Ethan: Ethan Eng
Michael: Michael Scott
Steve: Steve Hamelin
Pranay: Pranay Noel
Allan: Ben Petrie
John Woodman: Saul Rubinek
Rich Sommer: Paul Stanos
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.