CNET:
“Pirates” focuses on the heated personal rivalry between Steve Jobs of Apple and Bill Gates of Microsoft, recounting the parallel and often intertwined stories of the two companies and their tempestuous founders. Written and directed by photojournalist and documentary-maker Martyn Burke, the TV movie was based on the book “Fire in the Valley: The Making of The Personal Computer” by Paul Freiberger and Michael Swaine. It was first shown on TNT in June 1999.
“Pirates” is focused on recounting events rather than getting into the heads of its characters, so there’s not a great deal of insight into their motivations.
I watched this when it came out and remember thinking, while it was a “fun” movie, it really wasn’t very good. I’ll have to watch it again in light of the past 15 years. I was in the third row of the Macworld Expo Keynote audience when Noah Wylie came out in character as Steve Jobs and the place went bananas.
And Steve Jobs once said that he loved how Noah portrayed him in that movie, which is why he ended up at Macworld Expo. When the Sorkin movie was announced, I was one of those that hoped that Wylie would be chosen to re-play the part.
I enjoyed it, keeping in mind how fictionalized it was. Which is why I’m looking forward to seeing what Sorkin and Boyle have done.
Interesting factoid. Woz says Pirates was pretty accurate historically (for example, Bill Gates drag racing bulldozers and getting thrown in jail was true). The things said did not line up with fact, but the actual event portrayed in the movie were pretty much accurate.
the final sentence of the linked article:
From what I hear of the film, it doesn’t. So you can mock the film by saying it remakes half of “Pirates of Silicon Valley”.
In my imagination I take Wylie’s appearance as Jobs subtly saying to the filmmakers, “say what you will about me, I can buy and sell all of you if I wanted to.”
Though that isn’t fair to Pirates of Silicon Valley.
It still covered Jobs’ denial of paternity of his first daughter, but it was a smaller part of the story, certainly not the center of the movie’s advertising campaign like the current film has.