fans rejoice. Jesse Armstrong has again gathered together a conclave of uber-wealthy megalomaniacs in a delicious satire.
which the 鈥沦耻肠肠别蝉蝉颈辞苍鈥� creator wrote and directed, is a new made-for-HBO movie that leaves behind the backstabbing machinations of media moguls for the not-any-better power plays of tech billionaires.
Or, at least, three billionaires. Their host for a poker weekend in the mountains at a sprawling estate named after Ayn Rand鈥檚 鈥淭he Fountainhead鈥� is Hugo the solo member of the group not to reach, as they say, 鈥淏-nut鈥� status. His net worth is a paltry $521 million.
The others are three of the wealthiest men in the world. Randall (Steve Carell) is their senior, a kind of Steve Jobs-like mentor they all call 鈥淧apa Bear.鈥� Jeff who runs the world鈥檚 leading AI company, calls Randall the 鈥淒ark Money Gandalf.鈥� Lastly, but maybe most notably, is Venis (Cory Michael Smith), whose social media platform boasts 4 billion users globally.
But the latest update to Venis鈥� platform, named Traam, is causing havoc. As the four gather at Hugo鈥檚 isolated perch in the Utah mountains, news reports describe violence sweeping across Asia due to an outbreak of deepfakes on Traam that have wrecked any sense of reality.
Yet what鈥檚 real for this quartet of digital oligarchs 鈥� none of whom has a seemingly direct real-life corollary, all of whom are immediately recognizable 鈥� is more to the point of 鈥淢辞耻苍迟补颈苍丑别补诲,鈥� a frightfully credible comedy about the delusions of tech utopianism. Each of the four, with the exception of some hesitancy on the part of Jeff, are zealous futurists. On the way to Mountainhead, a doctor gives Randall a fatal diagnosis that he outright refuses. 鈥淎ll the things we can do and we can鈥檛 fix one tiny little piece of gristle in me?鈥�
But together, in Armstrong鈥檚 dense, highly quotable dialogue, their arrogance reaches hysterical proportions. While the cast is altogether excellent, this is most true with Smith鈥檚 Venis, a tech bro to end all tech bros. As the news around the world gets worse and worse, his certainty doesn鈥檛 waver. Earth, itself, no longer hold much interest for him. 鈥淚 just want to get us transhuman!鈥� he shouts.
Progress (along with net worth) is their cause, and much of the farce of 鈥淢ountainhead鈥� derives from just how much any semblance of compassion for humanity has left the building. It鈥檚 in the way Venis blanches at the mention of his baby son. It鈥檚 in the way, as death counts escalate in the news on their phones, they toy with world politics like kids at a Risk board. In one perfectly concise moment, Venis asks, sincerely, 鈥淒o you believe in other people?鈥�
If 鈥沦耻肠肠别蝉蝉颈辞苍鈥� filtered its media satire through family relationships, 鈥淢ountainhead鈥� runs on the dynamics of bro-styled male friendship. There are beefs, hug-it-out moments, passive-aggressive put downs and eruptions of anger. Part of the fun of Armstrong鈥檚 film isn鈥檛 just how their behavior spills into a geopolitical events but how it manifests, for example, in which room everyone gets.
All of 鈥淢ountainhead鈥� unfolds in the one location, with white mountaintops stretching in the distance outside the floor-to-ceiling windows. It could be a play. Instead, though, it鈥檚 something that either hardly exists anymore or, maybe, exists everywhere: the made-for-TV movie.
There鈥檚 no lack of films made for streaming services, but many of them fall into some in-between aesthetic that couldn鈥檛 fill a big screen and feel a touch disposable on the small screen. But 鈥淢ountainhead鈥� adheres to the tradition of the HBO movie; it's lean, topical and a fine platform for its actors. And for Armstrong, it鈥檚 a way to keep pursuing some of the timely themes of 鈥沦耻肠肠别蝉蝉颈辞苍鈥� while dispensing lines like: 鈥淐oup-out the U.S.? That鈥檚 a pretty big enchilada.鈥�
鈥淢辞耻苍迟补颈苍丑别补诲,鈥� an HBO Films release, is unrated by the Motion Picture Association. Running time: 109 minutes. Three stars out of four.
Jake Coyle, The Associated Press
