Filmmaker Alex Gibney spent four years investigating Elon Musk for his new documentary. What began as an interest in the billionaire’s achievements turned into anger over his growing power and business practices.
Director Alex Gibney admired Elon Musk’s work and even owned Tesla solar panels and a Powerwall at his home. Gibney’s interest in Musk grew after he noticed how the tech entrepreneur accumulated impossibly vast amounts of wealth and power. He decided to make a film about Musk and spent four years researching the man’s life and business practices.
The resulting film titled Musk is nearly four hours long and includes interviews and legal documents along with video footage. Gibney said he started with interest in Musk’s work but became increasingly upset while making the film. He said his anger increased after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth discussed integrating Musk’s AI company xAI into the Department of War.
The film’s upcoming release has sparked controversy with Musk insulting Gibney and threatening a lawsuit according to NPR. Musk’s lawyer Alex Spiro sent a letter to Gibney’s company that emerged in September over an exchange between Gibney and Ashley St. Clair. St. Clair has a child with Musk.
The film shows Musk sending St. Clair messages that suggested he had unusual knowledge about the 2024 presidential election. Spiro’s letter claimed Gibney falsely suggested SpaceX satellites changed votes in a debunked conspiracy theory. Gibney said he didn’t claim Musk changed votes but only that he bragged about having special knowledge of the election outcome.
He admitted he didn’t know if Musk was lying or just bragging in the messages.
Gibney has previously made documentaries about Enron and Elizabeth Holmes and prepared for the possibility that Musk might sue him. He hired lawyers to review everything in the film and even used an independent fact checker for his own fact checkers. Gibney also noted that a lawsuit could give him access to Musk’s internal documents through legal discovery.
As he took a closer look at SpaceX and Tesla Gibney noticed both companies had achieved real technological progress. But he also saw what he described as Musk overselling the capabilities of both companies. SpaceX was helping carry supplies into space and developing reusable rockets but Musk also promoted it as a mission to colonize Mars.
Tesla helped make electric vehicles popular but Gibney’s film argues that Musk oversold their self-driving features. He said Tesla cars didn’t have enough sensors for true self-driving and connected that shortcoming to some crashes. Gibney described this kind of overpromising as behavior that could be seen as fraudulent.
NPR reached out to Musk’s attorney but did not receive a response about the specific claims in the film. The documentary Musk opens in select theaters on October 9 with a wider release beginning October 16. It is expected to stream on HBO Max in the coming months.
IMAGE: Alex Gibney at the Vanity Fair party celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Tribeca Film Festival.. Photo: David Shankbone / Wikimedia, taken 2011-04-27, CC BY 3.0