Antitrust

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Remember back in the late '90s/early '00s, when everybody thought that Microsoft was an evil Mega Corp hell-bent on Taking Over The (Computer) World by any means necessary? (Well, even more than they do today?) Well, what if "any means necessary" included murder? And what if it was up to one plucky programmer to expose their malevolence?

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the plot of Antitrust.

Antitrust is a 2001 Thriller starring Ryan Phillippe, Tim Robbins, Rachael Leigh Cook and Claire Forlani. Milo Hoffman (Phillippe) is a young programmer from Silicon Valley whose talents earn him the notice of the Portland-based software corporation NURV, run by billionaire philanthropist Gary Winston (Robbins). Winston wants Milo to help him develop a new system called Synapse, which will link all the world's computers, cell phones and other electronic devices via satellite. While at NURV, he starts falling for a young programmer named Lisa (Cook), which wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that he already has a girlfriend in Alice (Forlani). However, after his programmer buddy Teddy is murdered, Milo starts to uncover evidence that NURV may have been behind it... and the murder of countless other programmers in order to steal their work and claim it as their own. Out of a mix of duty to his dead friend and disgust at his employers, Milo sets out to destroy NURV from within and give Synapse to the people... unless NURV stops him first and claims him as their next victim.

While it generally got a poor reception from professional critics and left little impact on the box office, it's attracted a cult following from computer geeks due to its realistic portrayal of hacking and computers in general. It's also a wonderful time capsule of late '90s computer culture.

Tropes used in Antitrust include:

• Asian and Nerdy: Teddy.
• Chekhov's Gun: Milo's sesame seed allergy.
• Cool Car: Milo's company car, a white Mercedes SUV, is portrayed as this in comparison to the Buick that the Department of Justice would've given him for helping to take down NURV instead. Alice's Citroen 2CV also qualifies, in a cute and quirky sort of way.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: Winston.
• Heel Face Turn: Alice/Rebecca.
• Hollywood Hacking: Averted. The filmmakers went out of their way to portray hacking, the Linux community, and dawn-of-the-millennium computer technology in a fairly realistic manner. In fact, the only really glaring error was the character's use of an Apple laptop in the finale (hackers hardly ever use Apples), and that's probably more attributable to studio-enforced Product Placement than any lack of research.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: NURV ultimately gets brought down when Milo hacks into Synapse and uses it to broadcast incriminating evidence to the entire world.
• Hollywood Nerd: Milo and Lisa. Seeing as how they're played by Ryan Phillippe and Rachael Leigh Cook, definitely Type 2.
• In Love with the Mark: Alice/Rebecca falls in love with Milo, and betrays NURV in order to stay with him.
• Information Wants to Be Free
• Love Triangle: Milo/Alice/Lisa.
• Mega Corp: NURV.
• The Mole: Both Alice/Rebecca and Lisa at various points. The former starts out as this, but falls In Love with the Mark and does a Heel Face Turn. The latter, meanwhile, pretends to help Milo in his crusade against NURV, but then turns him in to their security.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Gary Winston is this to Bill Gates, with NURV as his Microsoft.
• Oh Crap: Alice's reaction when Milo addresses her by her real name, Rebecca. Also happens to Winston when he sees the Synapse broadcast exposing his crimes.
• The Other Rainforest: NURV is based in Portland, Oregon. The film itself was also shot largely in Vancouver.
• Politically-Incorrect Villain: Invoked by NURV, who hired a pair of racist thugs to kill Teddy. They were banking on the "hate crime" angle to throw off any attention from their involvement.
• Product Placement:
  • Pepsi soda and Pringles potato chips get in a lot of appearances.
  • Everyone Owns a Mac: The Synapse broadcast is done with a Macintosh PowerBook G3.
• Shown Their Work: The filmmakers consulted Linux professionals in order to get their representation of the technology and culture right, used the GNOME desktop/GUI, and even scored cameos from Miguel de Icaza and Scott McNealy.
• Significant Monogram: Gary Winston... GW... WG... William Gates... nope, nothing significant about that.
• Snap Back: Occurs when a NURV employee enters the children's play area and accesses the hidden computer terminal. Somehow, Milo manages to escape (relatively) unnoticed.
• Stoic Spectacles: Milo wears thick-framed glasses fairly consistently to read and use computers.
• Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: How does a total nerd like Milo score a hot girlfriend like Alice, who hardly shares his interests? Because she's a corporate spy who's trying to recruit him into NURV, that's why. Of course, this is Ryan Phillippe we're talking about here.
• Unintentional Period Piece
• Villain with Good Publicity: Winston, thanks to his philanthropic work (a reference to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation).