Ghost in the Machine is a gripping and urgently relevant investigative documentary that exposes the buried history of artificial intelligence, not as a neutral system of algorithms, but as a technology shaped by racism, misogyny, eugenics, and entrenched structures of power long before it entered everyday life. Rejecting the notion of AI as inevitable or objective, the film traces how myths of progress and efficiency have obscured deeper political and cultural agendas, revealing the ideological foundations beneath the systems now reshaping modern society.

The Garden Cinema View:

Director Valerie Veatch channels Adam Curtis for this provocative and scathing examination of Silicon Valley, AI industries, and the philosophies that drive this volatile sector. Will AI save humanity, destroy us all, or is it actually a complex money making grift? Veatch’s driving thesis is that that pattern recognition programmes that comprise these ‘intelligences’ are rooted in 19th century race science and eugenics. A big claim, but not one the rouges gallery of tech bros have done much to disprove. Whilst Ghost in the Machine feels a bit like a long form video essay, it provides an important disrobing of these new cyber-tycoons.