{"id":840889,"date":"2026-09-08T19:02:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T19:02:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/840889\/"},"modified":"2026-09-08T19:02:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T19:02:10","slug":"musk-film-simulates-elon-musk-interview-using-statements-ceo-has-made","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/840889\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Musk’ film simulates Elon Musk interview using statements CEO has made"},"content":{"rendered":"

VENICE, Italy (AP) \u2014 A new documentary about Elon Musk<\/a> uses a CGI avatar and artificial intelligence voice syncing to simulate an interview with the SpaceX and Tesla CEO using things he\u2019s really said in interviews.<\/p>\n

The choice, filmmaker Alex Gibney said Tuesday in Venice before the film\u2019s world premiere, was intentionally ironic. It both references Musk\u2019s proposition that we\u2019re all living in a simulation and pokes at his somewhat paradoxical and shifting views<\/a> of the technology. Gibney said it is to convey the \u201creality of what he\u2019s done and unreality of his narrative.\u201d<\/p>\n

The filmmakers consulted lawyers before going too far down the road and got the sign-off to use the Musk avatar. <\/p>\n

The Oscar-winning filmmaker was joined at the Venice Film Festival by Ashley St. Clair, once a conservative influencer, who shares a child with Musk and who appears in the film. She talks about their relationship, his character and the nondisclosure agreement she was asked, and refused, to sign to guarantee paternity support.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was offered the opportunity not to speak for $40 million,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

St. Clair earlier this year also sued Musk\u2019s AI company<\/a>, saying its Grok chatbot allowed users to generate sexually exploitive deepfake images of her that have caused her humiliation and emotional distress.<\/p>\n

The film goes into Musk\u2019s takeover of X and what Gibney says is the manipulation of the algorithm.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne thing that I didn\u2019t properly understand when I started the film was how Musk tweaked algorithms at Twitter to, in fact, prioritize vitriol and hate over, you know, the town square,\u201d Gibney said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWired\u201d reporter Zo\u00eb Schiffer, who also appears in the film, added that \u201che has tweaked the algorithm, both to suppress mainstream journalism and then to augment some of the more inflammatory comments and voices on that platform.\u201d<\/p>\n

St. Clair said she believes he\u2019s stoking fires and \u201ccausing deliberate division that could be catastrophic if it\u2019s not regulated or contained.\u201d<\/p>\n

With a runtime of nearly four hours, \u201cMusk\u201d delves into his traumatic childhood, including an interview with his father, Errol Musk, and traces his early days in Silicon Valley through his DOGE work with the second Donald Trump administration and involvement in right-wing politics internationally<\/a>. It was, Gibney said, going to be a much shorter film before Musk wrapped himself in Trump\u2019s campaign. <\/p>\n

Those interviewed include Tesla co-founder Martin Eberhard, his first wife Justine Musk, neurologist Sam Harris, tech reporter Kara Swisher and former USAID Administrator Samantha Power.<\/p>\n

Gibney said he thinks Musk is \u201cextremely\u201d dangerous to democracy. The film, which will be released in theaters in October, raises alarms about the information the \u201cDOGE boys\u201d<\/a> gathered on U.S. citizens with their unfettered access to so many government agencies.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

For ongoing coverage of the 2026 Venice Film Festival, visit: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/venice-film-festival<\/a><\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

This story has been updated to remove a reference to the use of an AI avatar to simulate the Musk interview.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"VENICE, Italy (AP) \u2014 A new documentary about Elon Musk uses a CGI avatar and artificial intelligence voice…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":840890,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[332262,181,196778,84821,8649,3483,10167,12,11,88,203056,52208,793,82938,173823,355995,206,355994,28315,74,795,24350,965],"class_list":["post-840889","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-alex-gibney","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-ashley-st-clair","tag-childrens-entertainment","tag-democracy","tag-department-of-government-efficiency","tag-documentaries","tag-donald-trump","tag-elon-musk","tag-entertainment","tag-errol-musk","tag-fairs-and-festivals","tag-general-news","tag-justine-musk","tag-kara-swisher","tag-martin-eberhard","tag-movies","tag-sam-harris","tag-space-exploration-technologies-corp","tag-technology","tag-u-s-news","tag-venice-film-festival","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840889","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/840890"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}