Tired of staring at your phone all the time? Try one of these pieces of clickbait cinema instead. 1. The Matrix (1999) Made when the internet was still, for most people, just a dial-up diversion, the Wachowski siblings’ spectacular sci-fi combines a manga plot with Hong Kong-style action and much philosophical musing. Computer programmer Thomas “Neo” Anderson (Keanu Reeves) discovers the truth about real life – it isn’t real. Instead it’s a simulation used by evil robots to keep humanity enslaved, “a prison for your mind”, according to Neo’s mentor Morpheus (Lawrence Fishburne). Shot on sets left over from Alex Proyas’ Dark City (1998), the scenes that take place inside The Matrix have the greenish tint of a PC monitor, and show Neo turning into a kind of cyber superhero to game the system in style. From its groundbreaking special effects to its investment in Reeves as an action hero , the film was way ahead of its time. Perhaps its most prescient prediction is how, when given the red pill/blue pill choice, some people prefer to live entirely online. 2. Pulse (2001) Most J-horror films from the turn of the millennium deal with the intersection of technology and loneliness. Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s chiller goes one step further, using the internet as a portal for lonely ghosts to invade this plane of existence – not that they find much succour on the other side of the screen. The story, such as it is, concerns Tokyo girl Kudo Michi (Kumiko Aso), a plant shop worker whose colleague Taguchi (Kenji Mizuhashi) commits suicide after working on a strange disk – remember them? – a plot trope borrowed from Hideo Nakata’s Ring (1998). Soon she and her friends are experiencing all kinds of supernatural phenomena, and this spirals outwards into an apocalypse of loneliness. Besides its disquieting hauntings, what’s so striking about the film is how depressed and disconnected the characters are, boxed into airless little bedrooms staring at screens while the world falls apart around them. If that seemed pessimistic in 2001, today it feels prophetic. 3. The Social Network (2010) Adapted by Aaron Sorkin ( The West Wing ) from Ben Mezrich’s book The Accidental Billionaires , and directed by David Fincher, this prestige drama tells the story of the founding of Facebook by a group of – largely objectionable – people who spend far too much time on their computers. When Harvard University student Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) is dumped by his girlfriend (Rooney Mara), he retires to his dorm to bitch about her on his blog. This hot streak of incel inspiration leads to a website called Facemash, which asks visitors to rate the attractiveness of female students, and then to Thefacebook, as it was first called. While the rat-tat-tat dialogue and whizzy visuals match the Fomo-infused speed of the internet, that was never the attraction for Sorkin. “The invention itself is as modern as it gets,” he told The Craft , “but the story is as old as storytelling; the themes of friendship, loyalty, jealousy, class and power.” Perhaps the ultimate irony is that, as Zuckerberg becomes a social media pioneer, he loses all his pals. 4. Unfriended (2014) Levan Gabriadze’s gimmicky horror takes place entirely on the heroine’s browser and captures the shallow, hectic quality of online interaction. Inspired by the suicides of several real-life cyberbullying victims, it follows Laura Barns (Heather Sossaman) and her friends as they chat over Skype one evening, only to be interrupted by someone purporting to be Blaire (Shelley Hennig), a friend of theirs who committed suicide a year ago. Could it really be her? Well, yes, and she is soon forcing them to reveal their darkest secrets, then picking them off one by one in a variety of lockdown-appropriate ways – scenes which will no doubt resonate with those who have made far too many Zoom calls over the past few months. Appropriately enough, casting took place over video chat, and the entire film was shot in real time with the main characters on actual computers. Additionally, all Facebook and Skype accounts shown in the film existed in real life, although you access them at your peril. 5. Searching (2018) A whip-smart thriller told entirely on computer and smartphone screens, Aneesh Chaganty’s excellent directing debut was conceived as a short, then expanded to feature length. After losing his wife to lymphoma, single dad David Kim (John Cho) is bringing up his teenage daughter Margot (Michelle La) alone, until one night she goes to a piano lesson and never comes home. Can he find her using only the online trail of her emails and Facebook posts? From drone and news helicopter footage to webcams and video calls, Chaganty uses everything he can to keep the story moving – even his own iPhone, which became the film’s main camera. Amid the blur of information, keep an eye out for Easter eggs and clues as to what’s really going on. At various points you can see references to Laura Barns from Unfriended , that stupid dress that almost broke the internet in 2015, and the word “catfish”, a slang term for pretending to be someone else online. Want more articles like this? Follow SCMP Film on Facebook If you, or someone you know, are having suicidal thoughts, help is available. For Hong Kong, dial +852 2896 0000 for The Samaritans or +852 2382 0000 for Suicide Prevention Services. In the US, call The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on +1 800 273 8255.