VENICE - Alex Gibney says Elon Musk’s political evolution represents something far more coordinated than the billionaire’s public persona suggests, and that fear of retaliation made potential interview subjects unusually reluctant to speak on the record.
The Oscar-winning documentarian, speaking at the Venice Film Festival about his new film Musk, described a pronounced “almost existential fear” among people he approached for the project. Gibney, known for probing portraits of powerful figures such as Enron and Scientology, said the trepidation he encountered was unlike anything in his previous work - a chilling effect he attributes to Musk’s immense wealth and influence.
Gibney’s documentary, which premiered to festival audiences this weekend, frames Musk not simply as a tech visionary or erratic social media personality, but as a driving force behind a “global right-wing agenda.” The filmmaker contends that Musk’s interventions - from platform policy decisions to political endorsements - have helped shift the Overton window on issues ranging from immigration to regulation, often with an ideological coherence that critics overlook.
The director told reporters that the difficulty of securing candid conversations became a central theme of the production itself. Several former colleagues, business partners, and government officials declined to participate entirely, Gibney said, while others agreed to talk only under conditions of anonymity or after extensive legal review. He characterized their hesitation as rooted less in personal embarrassment than in genuine concern over professional or legal consequences - a dynamic he called both “chilling” and “revealing” about the current climate for investigative journalism.
Gibney stopped short of labeling Musk a puppet master, but he argued that the entrepreneur’s global reach - through SpaceX, Tesla, X, and other ventures - has effectively created a private infrastructure for shaping public discourse. The film weaves together archival footage, interviews with Musk’s supporters and skeptics, and on-the-ground reporting from multiple countries, aiming to show how one individual’s worldview can ripple across elections, supply chains, and cultural debates.
Asked why he chose to tackle Musk now, Gibney said the timing felt urgent, particularly as the entrepreneur has become more explicit about his political preferences and has used his platforms to amplify far-right figures. The documentary does not purport to offer a balanced portrait, Gibney acknowledged, but he insisted that its purpose is not to villify - rather, to trace the mechanisms by which concentrated power operates in the modern media landscape.
Musk marks Gibney’s return to the festival circuit after a string of projects focused on institutional failure and moral compromise. Early reviews from Venice have been divided, with some critics praising its ambition and others questioning whether the film spends enough time on Musk’s engineering achievements or his devoted fan base. Gibney, however, remains unapologetic about his angle. “This is not a biography,” he said. “It’s an investigation into influence.”
The runtime of 36 minutes is notably brief for Gibney, whose documentaries often exceed two hours. The concise format appears deliberate, packing a dense argument into a tight frame that may suit streaming audiences. The film is scheduled for a 2022 release date, though the metadata lists it as premiering this year - a scheduling quirk that Gibney did not address during the press conference.
While the documentary’s title focuses squarely on Musk, the Venice program also highlights a supporting narrative that has drawn attention: Juliet Merdinian, a character who, twenty years after being orphaned, seeks out the men who changed her destiny through a single powerful memory - the scent they left behind. This dramatic subplot, directed by A.R. Rahman and starring Nora Arnezeder, adds a human counterpoint to the political machinery Gibney examines. Rahman, better known as an Oscar-winning composer for Slumdog Millionaire, steps behind the camera here, delivering a 36-minute piece that premiered on May 17, 2022. The cast includes Guy Burnet, Munirih Grace, and Gianni Macchia in a tale set entirely in English despite its Venice debut.
For Gibney, the pairing of these two stories on the festival slate - one about a billionaire’s reach, the other about personal memory and loss - may be coincidental, but it underscores his larger point about the intersection of individual lives and vast systems of power. As he put it, “We all carry scents from our past, but not all of us have the capacity to change the world’s atmosphere.”
The filmmaker closed his Venice remarks with a call for more journalists to take on subjects like Musk, despite the risks. “If we only write about people who are safe to criticize, we’ve already lost the story,” he said. “The fear is real. But so is the need to push through it.”
Musk is currently seeking distribution following its festival screenings.
Source: Hollywood Reporter
