Sundance Documentary Claims to Expose AI’s Dark Truth

A documentary premiering at Sundance this week reckons it reveals the disturbing reality behind AI’s rapid rise.

It all starts with a chilling story from 2016 that predicted today’s AI chaos. “Ghost in the Machine” opens with Microsoft’s experimental chatbot ‘Tay,’ which transformed into a hate-spewing machine within 24 hours of launch, opening what director Valerie Veatch calls a Pandora’s Box that’s now consuming the creative industry.

Well, that’s one take. If you’re keen on AI, then stick with that positive mindset.

But in terms of the doc, critics were calling Veatch’s investigation a “searing takedown of techno-fascism” that directly targets Elon Musk and Silicon Valley’s power structure. Footage from the film connects AI’s origins to discredited racist eugenics movements from a century ago, revealing the ugly truth behind the technology’s glossy promises.

Bias and control

Veatch’s personal experiments with AI tools produced disturbing racial biases and highly sexualized images without prompting. These weren’t glitches—they were features of a system built on what she discovered to be “extraction, exploitation, and control.”

Breaking down Silicon Valley’s narrative piece by piece, her investigation exposes the underpaid human workforce grinding out content moderation behind the scenes. While tech billionaires tout AI as revolutionary, hidden camera footage reveals the all-too-human labor force working for dismal pay at the bottom of the AI stack.

Evidence suggests AI represents just the latest attempt by “powerful, exclusionary white guys to remake the whole world in their own image”. This isn’t progress—it’s a century-old playbook dressed up in new technology.

If you’re still here, there’s more.

The industry war

While Veatch calls for “radical resistance” to AI adoption, Hollywood insiders reveal the entertainment industry is already fracturing. Film executives are secretly using AI to evaluate scripts in real-time, replacing human readers with machines that generate story notes without any human reaction.

Studios facing budget pressure are choosing AI-generated content that delivers “80% of the quality for 10% of the cost,” fundamentally reshaping how films get made. First drafts get AI analysis. Story notes? Generated by machines. Human readers? Eliminated entirely.

Warning signs emerged during the 2023 Hollywood strikes, when both writers and actors made AI protection a headline cause. Rolling Stone reported back in May 2023 on the technology’s threat to creative jobs, but the industry dismissed these fears as premature. Now, less than three years later, the predictions are becoming brutal reality.

Impact and consequences

Historian Yuval Noah Harari warned this month that AI’s true impact will unfold over 200 years, meaning current decision-makers focused on short-term profits are unleashing consequences they can’t possibly understand. Harari compared the current moment to the early Industrial Revolution, whose deepest consequences took generations to emerge through social, political, and geopolitical upheaval.

Even if AI development stopped today, Harari argues the long-term effects would remain impossible to grasp. Yet the technology is already reshaping documentary filmmaking itself, with AI tools being used for everything from transcription to historical recreations, creating an ironic situation where films criticizing AI must navigate using the very technology they’re exposing.

Industry analysis reveals the cruel mathematics: studios won’t pay for 100% human creativity when they can get 80% of the quality for 10% of the cost. As one industry insider warns, “if you’re just selling words on a page, AI will win on speed and cost every time.”

The choice that can’t be undone

Veatch’s solution cuts through the industry chaos with startling clarity: center communities on care, rebuild human connections, and resist uncritical AI adoption at all costs. Her documentary’s “NOT AI” labeling system isn’t just a gimmick—it’s a battle cry for preserving human creativity in an age of algorithmic replacement.

Beyond Hollywood, Veatch’s investigation reveals the human cost of this transformation. Her film doesn’t just diagnose the problem—it sounds an urgent alarm about what society is losing in its rush to embrace machine-generated everything.

Here are the top eight things you should never paste into an AI chatbot, ranked from easy-to-overlook mistakes to the most dangerous exposures.

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