A week ago came the news that distributor NEON has swooped in and acquired Luca Guadagnino’s “Artificial” with plans for an Oscar-qualifying run later this year. Now, further details about that acquisition have emerged.
The film follows the meteoric rise of OpenAI – the company behind ChatGPT – along with the personal rivalries, ego clashes, and ethical tensions behind the scenes. Last month, Amazon Studios essentially dumped the $40 million budget film, which then sought distribution elsewhere.
Multiple distributors passed until NEON came in. Page Six now alleges that NEON only agreed to a deal for the film with a no-money guarantee – which means essentially NEON didn’t pay any upfront licensing fee to distribute the film; it was essentially given to them.
They do have to pay for marketing and distribution, which is expected to cost around $20 million. The paper also backtracks a bit on its claim, adding that another source familiar with the “Artificial” deal has “disputed that no money changed hands – but didn’t divulge an actual figure”.
It follows on from a report at Vulture on Friday which indicated the film has been extensively test-screened and is in the final stages of post-production.
One executive called it “more of a streaming movie than a theatrical play” but praised the quality and its “satire of Silicon Valley social mores”. That piece also goes into how the film went over budget, required extensive reshoots, and shifted “markedly darker” than the original script.
Though he had success with “Call Me by Your Name” and “Challengers,” Guadagnino is coming off a not-so-good run of late with “Queer” failing to get awards attention along with the disastrous “After the Hunt”.
That might be why scooper MyTimeToShineH indicated today that Guadagnino is being eyed to direct a future MCU feature. Guadagnino was attached to a “Sgt. Rock” film for a while at DC Studios, but that fell through.
Indiewire adds that “Artificial” is expected to premiere at the Venice Film Festival next month. Andrew Garfield, Yura Borisov, Monica Barbaro, Mark Rylance, Jason Schwartzman, Zosia Mamet, Cooper Hoffman, Cooper Koch, Chris O’Dowd, and Billie Lourd co-star.
