Amazon MGM Studios has walked away from Luca Guadagnino's nearly complete film 'Artificial,' starring Andrew Garfield as Sam Altman, after test screenings showed audiences reacting coolest to the Altman and Elon Musk characters in a story centered on the 2023 OpenAI board upheaval.
Luca Guadagnino's movie chronicling the 2023 OpenAI board coup has been dropped by Amazon. According to Variety, test screenings showed that the characters of Sam Altman and Elon Musk were portrayed as the least sympathetic and the ones audiences would 'like the least'.
Amazon is making a movie about the events involving OpenAI's board in 2023. Looks like Sam Altman may be played by Andrew Garfield.
The studio's exit follows its February 2026 OpenAI agreement on AWS expansion and custom models, leaving the project to be shopped elsewhere despite an Amazon statement praising Guadagnino and expressing hope for future collaboration.
Insiders noted the Altman and Musk portrayals landed as the least sympathetic, though broader test-audience response to the film itself was reported as very positive before the change in distributor plans.
Positive users want to see Amazon's dropped Luca Guadagnino film 'Artificial' about Sam Altman for its meme potential and AI themes, while negative users dismiss it as uninteresting propaganda or suspect interference in the cancellation.
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same. i want to know why Amazon is trying to bury it.
If you have a script/screener of this movie, I would love to see it https://variety.com/2026/film/global/luca-guadagnino-sam-altman-movie-artificial-dropped-amazon-1236785830/
https://variety.com/2026/film/global/luca-guadagnino-sam-altman-movie-artificial-dropped-amazon-1236785830/
Luca Guadagnino's movie chronicling the 2023 OpenAI board coup has been dropped by Amazon. According to Variety, test screenings showed that the characters of Sam Altman and Elon Musk were portrayed as the least sympathetic and the ones audiences would 'like the least'.
@AndrewCurran_ I really wanted to see this movie
@AndrewCurran_ People forget that the board's position was so bad that the person they promoted internally to be CEO switched over to supporting Altman, and the guy they brought on to be the new CEO met with them to find out what was going on & then announced publicly that Altman should return.
@GaryMarcus They're not burying it. It will be released by someone else
@AndrewCurran_ They could've just changed it to a Melania style movie. Focused on his world coin project, partnership with Bernie Sanders and him building a family. Seeing another side would've been interesting
@AndrewCurran_ I want to watch it. Can someone buy the rights
@AndrewCurran_ Goddamn
@AndrewCurran_ the most accurate AI movie may be the one that never gets released.
not because the story is too boring.
because the partnerships, incentives, reputations, edits, and nervous institutions are already the plot.
@AndrewCurran_ Musk and Altman might have worked together to get it blocked
@AndrewCurran_ fuck..wanted to watch
welp, guess some glorious being will end up doing a silicon valley reskin limited series of the era and events. plop an absurdist comedy frame over reality and all good, hollywood
@bearlyai this guy?
@AndrewCurran_ Surely this makes other film studios want to pick it up right? Like if you have a movie that gets dropped by Amazon because they don't want to piss off their business partner that seems like good press
@AndrewCurran_ Bezos didn't want the smoke with Elon.
@AndrewCurran_ > the characters of Sam Altman and Elon Musk were portrayed as the least sympathetic and the ones audiences would 'like the least'.
Wait, so what was the issue?
@AndrewCurran_ Altman said he sometimes has AI nightmares. There's a lot of film potential there.
@AndrewCurran_ just another anti AI propaganda movie
@AndrewCurran_ Oddly, for those who listened to the trial, the most unsympathetic major character was not Altman, or Musk....
@bearlyai
@bearlyai Andrew Garfield already looks more like Sam Altman than Sam Altman does 😭
