New Delhi: Hollywood’s “Silicon Valley tech bro” genre is set to dominate the big screen in October. While three of the upcoming films are about Sam Altman, Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, a fourth follows disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes. None looks likely to flatter its subject.
First up is Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Reckoning, which returns to Facebook more than 15 years after The Social Network. The first film was about a fresh-faced Mark Zuckerberg just starting out; this one is set in a darker time, when whistleblower Frances Haugen leaked internal documents in 2021 showing the company knew its platforms could be harmful to teenagers and spread misinformation.
Jeremy Strong plays Zuckerberg, with Mikey Madison as Haugen and Jeremy Allen White as Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz. The film releases on 9 October.
The next film was apparently enough to put Andrew Garfield off ChatGPT. He plays OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in Luca Guadagnino’s Artificial. The film is set during the November 2023 chaos at OpenAI, when Altman was abruptly fired by the board. He was reinstated after employees threatened to quit and investors clamoured for his return. Monica Barbaro plays Mira Murati who took over as interim CEO for a short while.
The film premieres at the New York Film Festival on 5 October before a limited US release on 25 December.
Then comes Elon Musk, this time not as a dramatised tech boss but as an AI version of himself. Alex Gibney’s nearly four-hour documentary Musk uses a CGI avatar and AI voice-syncing to recreate an interview with Musk, using actual quotes from him. It traces his rise from tech entrepreneur to the world’s richest man and a political powerbroker.
Musk, who refused to take part, has already called the film a “hit piece” and threatened legal action. The documentary will be released in select theatres on October 16.
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What happens after the fall?
One of Silicon Valley’s biggest cautionary tales is already well worn on screen. Elizabeth Holmes and the collapse of Theranos were the subject of HBO documentary The Inventor and Hulu series The Dropout, starring Amanda Seyfried.
Now comes You Can See Everything. The nearly three-hour A24 documentary by Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim begins 34 days before Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes reported to prison in 2023. After a meteoric rise, she had been convicted of fraud and conspiracy over claims about her company’s blood-testing technology and business practices. The documentary includes interviews with Holmes, as well as footage from her home life. It is reportedly due in US theatres on 16 October.