Independent filmmaker Luca Guadagnino turned heads when he had set his next film at Amazon MGM, who has been in some capacity involved in his last five feature films, as a project tabbed ‘The Social Network for the AI age’ while casting The Social Network star Andrew Garfield to play OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
Artificial, which co-stars 2024 Academy Award nominees Monica Barbaro (A Complete Unknown) and Yura Borisov (Anora), wrapped filming and began test screening when MGM, owned by Amazon, dropped the film from its slate. That came just months after an Amazon partnership had been announced with the AI company.
“We have the utmost respect and admiration for Luca Guadagnino as an award-winning filmmaker — not to mention a longstanding relationship that we hope to continue,” a spokesperson for Amazon said after The Town’s Matt Belloni dropped the news. “We believe that ‘Artificial’ will be better served if it were released by a different studio and are working closely with the filmmaking team to find the film a new home.”
The problem that Luca faced is that film was said to be ‘too grim’ about the prospects of AI, making it nearly impossible to shop. Following the Paramount merger with Skydance, Paramount began to have a vested interest in the success of AI because of Oracle, another company owned by the Ellison family, and their stake in generative AI. With their purchase of Warner pending, another legacy studio was off the table. A24, the studio in the States for arthouse awards players like Artificial, at the time had a pending AI strategic partnership announcement on the horizon, as well as board member Josh Kushner running Thrive Capital, which heavily invests in AI. Then there’s the political ramifications that come with studios taking on politically charged projects in a world where Donald Trump is actively trying to stifle anything that goes against his administration and their allies.
This left MUBI and NEON, with the former at one point circling and hoping to acquire. But it’s now reported by DEADLINE that NEON has acquired the film. Between Palme D’or recipient Fjord, Clarissa, Paper Tiger, and All of a Sudden all being early awards contenders, it remains to be seen if this is a legimate awards contender. But it is being reported that NEON believes this is an awards play and indie distributor continues to get an obscene amount of nominations this decade, so it isn’t entirely off the table. Regardless, a U.S. based distributor has finally stepped up to plan a robust theatrical release for Luca’s latest offering.
“The film, written by SNL‘s Simon Rich, chronicles the incredibly consequential days leading up to the sudden firing and reinstatement of Sam Altman as CEO of OpenAI, as the fate of who gets to control the technology at the center of an AI arms race hangs in the balance,” DEADLINE’s report reads. “The acquisition underscores Neon’s commitment to partnering with visionary filmmakers, and bringing ambitious cinema to audiences around the world. Artificial will compete in this year’s Oscar race.”
Expect this to show up at a festival, most likely Venice, as Luca is an Italian filmmaker. Seven of Gaudagnino’s feature narratives have debuted at the Venice Film Festival.
Jameus Mooney is an entertainment writer and editor for Comic Book Clique, having covered the entertainment industry for years. You can follow him on Twitter here, and Letterboxd here. You can also listen to his horror podcast, The 2:17 Horror Podcast, at the DeathArts XIII YouTube channel.