Artificial Premieres at New York Film Festival Ahead of Christmas Release
A boardroom sacking that shook Silicon Valley is now a Christmas Day movie.
Luca Guadagnino's Artificial had its world premiere on Monday, 5 October, at the New York Film Festival, according to Deadline. The film tells the origin story of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, and centres on chief executive Sam Altman and co-founder Ilya Sutskever.
Andrew Garfield stars as Altman, with Yura Borisov as Ilya, Deadline reported. The story revolves around Altman's firing and rehiring at OpenAI in 2023. The script is by Simon Rich, best known for Saturday Night Live, and the film runs 140 minutes.
The premiere took place at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall as part of the Main Slate, the festival's central line-up. Film at Lincoln Center announced on 1 September that the 2026 US film would world-premiere in the 64th edition, according to Film at Lincoln Center. A world premiere means the first public screening anywhere.
The road to that screening was bumpy. The film was produced under Amazon MGM Studios and was nearly finished when Amazon dropped it, Variety reported. Neon then acquired it for distribution and set a release for Christmas Day. The initial plan had reportedly been to skip the festival circuit altogether.
Festival organisers later added London as well. The film was set for berths at both the New York and London film festivals, Deadline reported. A trailer featuring Garfield as Altman was released in early September.
What makes this stand out for a general audience is the speed. The film spans two decades of machine learning research leading to the current AI debate, according to the festival listing. It turns a very recent tech power struggle into a holiday-season cinema release.
