Guadagnino explores power and control

At the New York Film Festival premiere of Artificial, director Luca Guadagnino said that when someone wants to play God, that's very interesting to him. The film explores who has power, who desperately wants it, and who will do anything to get it.

“when someone wants to play God, that's very interesting to me”

The film sticks to real OpenAI events

Artificial follows the factual events surrounding Sam Altman's rise to power at OpenAI and his brief ouster from the AI lab. The narrative adheres remarkably closely to what actually happened.

Golden Gate Bridge becomes a metaphor

The film opens with a stunning shot of San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge, which turns into a metaphor for building all-powerful AI systems. Altman repeatedly points to the bridge to convince others of their vision and to control the scientist.

Altman portrayed as manipulative psychopath

Andrew Garfield plays Sam Altman as a manipulative, power-hungry psychopath who lies easily and will use anyone to get what he wants. Garfield's performance is disturbingly riveting and paints the most damning picture of the OpenAI CEO yet in any form of media.

Paul Graham's prescient 2008 quote

Geoffrey Hinton, the godfather of AI, references a two thousand eight quote by Paul Graham, cofounder of Y Combinator, about Sam Altman: You could parachute him into an island full of cannibals and come back in five years and he'd be the king.

“You could parachute him into an island full of cannibals and come back in 5 years and he'd be the king”

Altman uses physical touch to control

The film depicts Altman as astonishingly controlling through his penchant for physical touch. He hugs Mira Murati after hiring her, holds Ilya Sutskever's forearm then shoulder then neck, and during a meeting with Elon Musk sits in Sutskever's chair with him.

Altman wants to be the one in control

The film repeatedly touches on the central tension in OpenAI's trajectory: no one person or company should control superintelligent AI. Yet Altman himself wants to be that person. When asked about the org chart, Mira Murati simply says: Sam's in charge.

“Sam's in charge”

Real milestones structure the narrative

Unlike The Social Network, Artificial's themes are based on real circumstances. The film is structured by milestones that really happened: Sutskever meeting Hinton in the early two thousands at the University of Toronto, technology auctioned for upwards of forty million dollars to Google in two thousand twelve, and Sutskever and Hinton joining Google in March two thousand thirteen.

More real events in the timeline

The film covers a dinner between Sutskever, Altman, Brockman, Musk and others in Menlo Park in two thousand fifteen, and the time in two thousand seventeen that an OpenAI system won a game of Dota two against a human champion. These events actually occurred.

Some fictional liberties taken

The fictional Altman strolls into a bunker full of greenhouses and guns underneath his California home, which the real-life Altman does not have in that location. In another scene, a man representing the AI doomer cohort tells Sutskever: The question's not, How could this go wrong? It's, How could it not?

“The question's not, 'How could this go wrong?' It's, 'How could it not?'”

Altman's firing and documented missteps

The film depicts Altman's infamous firing beat by beat, including his well-documented missteps: pitting scientists and executives against one another, allegedly lying about whether the legal team said a model could skip safety processes, and releasing ChatGPT in November two thousand twenty-two without notifying the board first.

Altman calls Microsoft and demands reinstatement

Despite earlier reassuring the board they have power to fire anyone including him, Altman immediately dials Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella for support. He convenes OpenAI executives at his home to either get his role back or take everyone to Microsoft, leaving OpenAI as a shell company.

Altman dismisses board conditions with sass

When the board invites Altman back to discuss his return and offers stipulations like more transparency and no lying, he looks at his phone and gurgles a green smoothie through a straw. His demand is that they all resign immediately. When asked who he'd replace them with, he replies: I'll let you know.

“I'll let you know”

Murati's role largely left out of film

The film omits the extent to which Mira Murati reportedly had a hand in both Altman's ouster and reinstatement. She funneled significant information including screenshots and documentation to Ilya Sutskever, who took his concerns to the OpenAI board in the form of a fifty-two-page memo.

Amazon dropped the film after OpenAI deal

Amazon MGM Studios dropped Artificial in June after Amazon's fifty billion dollar investment in OpenAI. At the New York Film Festival, the opening speaker thanked Neon for standing behind the film, with the unsaid part being when Amazon wouldn't.

Cast jokes about real-world consequences

During a select cast Q and A after the screening, Ike Barinholtz said he had been nervous to portray Musk, joking he may get put in a gulag afterward. Another cast member darkly joined in, saying they'd maybe be put in the same one. Cooper Hoffman said the more he sat with the characters, the easier it is to feel: Oh, fuck, I hate these guys.

“Oh, fuck, I hate these guys”