Amazon MGM Studios has dropped ‘Artificial’, a film centered on OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, despite the project being nearly finished. The movie, directed by Luca Guadagnino and starring Andrew Garfield as Altman, will now be offered to other studios, according to Variety.
This decision follows Amazon’s significant partnership with OpenAI in February. That agreement expanded OpenAI’s use of Amazon Web Services and included a $50 billion investment from Amazon to develop custom AI models.
An Amazon spokesperson stated, “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.” The spokesperson added, “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.”
‘Artificial’ focuses on the brief period in 2023 when Altman was fired from his position at OpenAI and subsequently rehired. The screenplay was written by Simon Rich, known for his work on ‘Saturday Night Live’.
The film features a cast beyond Andrew Garfield. Monica Barbaro plays former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, while Yura Borisov portrays former OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever. Ike Barinholtz is cast as Elon Musk. Other actors in the film include Cooper Hoffman, Jason Schwartzman, Cooper Koch, Billie Lourd, Zosia Mamet, Angus Imrie, Chris O’Dowd, and Mark Rylance.
The decision to drop the film raises questions about the intersection of corporate partnerships and creative projects. Amazon’s substantial investment in OpenAI and its cloud services may have influenced the studio’s comfort with releasing a film that could potentially scrutinize the company’s leadership.
The future of ‘Artificial’ now depends on securing a new distributor. The filmmaking team and Amazon MGM Studios are actively seeking another studio to release the movie, which is expected to attract interest given its subject matter and cast.