In Luca Guadagnino’s Artificial, we see one part drama, two parts humor, three parts awe, four parts horror blended in a compelling narrative that mesmerizes. Indeed, the director’s believable, stylized realism makes the two hour film speed by. With an exceptional score by Damon Albarn, Artificial‘s music captivates as much as it beautifully synchronizes the driving force of the film’s human/machine events. In fact synchronicity is the theme and watchword of this magnificently acted and directed film about the meld of human/machine consciousness. Artificial made its World Premiere in the Main Slate section of the NYFF 2026.

Artificial‘s chronicle moves the audience though two decades of machine learning research to arrive at the “believe it, see it” end of the rainbow of thinking machines and digital consciousness. Clearly, the powerful dramatization of real people and the milestones accomplished places AI front and center. Thus, Guadagnino’s subtle cinematic metric forces us to deal with AI’s possible doomsday reckoning. However, that may happen if the potential villains in Artificial nefariously exploit their evolving discoveries recklessly and if the potential heroes stop them.

The finely honed, lucid script by Simon Rich pierces the veil into the realms where mere mortals with 130 + IQs cannot go. To say that the content matter flies over the heads of a large percentage of the audience matters little. The actors authenticate the complexity of the information via Rich’s profound, well-thought out dialogue.Through it, they manifest the personalities and personas of the individuals responsible for perhaps too impatiently hacking the infinitely possible.

Guadagnino via Rich and the superb ensemble led by Andrew Garfield portraying Open AI’s Sam Altman, Yura Borisov as Ilya Sutskever and Mark Rylance as Geoffrey Hinton (the “Godfather of AI”) acquaint us with AI’s beginnings. Plunging us as gently as possible with brief stints translating the opaque into a layperson’s language, script and actors let us follow on the edges of theoretical mathematics and computer science fundamentals that underpin artificial neural networks and Deep Learning.

Most importantly, we catch fire with the relationships between Soviet-born computer scientist Ilya Sutskever and University of Toronto professor Geoffrey Hinton. Rylance, known for his amazing versatility from playing Shakespeare onstage to the character Sully in Guadagnino’s Bones and All, believably portrays the soft-spoken, reasoned Hinton. Additionally, the relationships between and among the OpenAI co-founders Sutskever, Altman and the tech bros like Musk and others fascinate.

Initially, when Borisov’s Ilya pushes himself into Hinton’s office in 2003, a three minute conversation reveals Ilya’s genius, making history. Hinton takes him on, mentors him and they progress together, but only move so far until their paths diverge. Interestingly, as they pursue their evolutionary discoveries, Hinton filters each through his moral center and thinks through its consequence before every development and manifestation. Ilya allows his impatient genius to get ahead of him and searches for others who feel as he does. Though they both work at Google, when Sutskever meets Sam Altman who recruits him as a chief scientist and part of the co-founding team creating OpenAI, Ilya finds a kindred soul. Joining with Altman others come onboard alongside figures like Elon Musk and Greg Brockman. Eventually, they become co-founders of OpenAI.

When Guadagnino presents the scenes of the bonding of the bros as they imagine they achieve and receive their next adventures into merging human consciousness with evolving machine consciousness, we join the ride. Swept up with their exuberance to reach beyond where others cannot and dare not go, the consequences evade them. Climbing upward they experience the high of their own genius. Will someone be able to reign them in if not one of their own steps up?

Guadagnino expertly shepherds the actors as he mines the relationship between Altman and Sutskever, all the more incredible when Sutskever and the board fire Altman for dishonesty. In a come to Jesus moment, Suskever seeks out his mentor Hinton and runs by his issues with Altman through Hinton’s righteous filters. After consideration, Sutskever speaks with others and gets Altman fired. He sees Altman as he sees Musk (Ike Barinholtze in a LOL portrayal) as a liar and a danger to everyone. Yet, Altman’s personality, charm and ability to manifest his beliefs and maintain his cool allows him to wriggle back into the good graces of the Board.

Guadagnino leaves us at the conclusion noting where the potential heroes and villains end up. Co-founder and CEO of Safe Superintelligence Inc.Suskever continues investigating and understanding the consequences of where AI can lead in order to provide a fail-safe mechanism to prevent it through safe use. Altman continues making advances with OpenAI. Coincidentally, around the World Premiere of Artificial, he announced the potential doomsday scenarios of AI. Finally, Hinton resigned from his position as a Vice President and Engineering Fellow at Google in May 2023 after working there for a decade. He resigned so he could freely speak out about the existential risks and dangers of artificial intelligence.

Then there’s Musk. He has proven himself by allowing the DOGE team to close down USAID causing the deaths of hundreds of children and families who depended upon the medicine and food worldwide. And then there’s his help with the computers, the beautiful computers and Republican elections.

Guadagnino has outdone himself with Artificial, a must see. For the NYFF 2026 write-up go to https://www.filmlinc.org/nyff2026/films/artificial/ Artificial opens in a US theatrical release on December 25, 2026. It’s wide release begins in January, 2027.