Ghost in the Machine | Valerie Veatch on Power Myth Making and the Cost of So Called AI

In Ghost in the Machine, artificial intelligence is not the story. Power is.

Premiering at the Sundance Film Festival, the feature documentary from filmmaker Valerie Veatch dismantles the mythology surrounding AI and exposes the systems of labor exploitation bias and control hiding behind the technology’s glossy marketing language.

Rather than speculating about distant futures or sentient machines Ghost in the Machine grounds itself in the present asking a more urgent question Who benefits from these technologies and who pays the price

A Documentary About Power Not Progress

Veatch is no stranger to interrogating technology and culture. Her previous Sundance premieres Me at the Zoo and Love Child examined how emerging digital platforms reshape identity intimacy and agency. With Ghost in the Machine she turns her focus to AI at a moment when hype has overtaken scrutiny.

The film makes a clear distinction AI is not intelligence and it is not inevitable. It is a marketing term one that obscures the human labor and institutional power structures propping it up.

Throughout the documentary Veatch interviews sociologists computer scientists journalists and academics who collectively reveal a consistent pattern These systems reproduce existing inequalities under the guise of innovation.

The Myth of Neutral Technology

One of the film’s central revelations is that generative AI is anything but neutral. From biased outputs to hypersexualized imagery to discriminatory language patterns the technology reflects the values embedded in its data and design.

Veatch highlights research showing how large language models repeatedly assign women and people of color to positions of struggle subordination or absence within generated narratives. These are not glitches. They are structural outcomes.

When these systems are framed as creative tools the danger multiplies. Authorship becomes diluted responsibility disappears and harmful representations gain legitimacy simply by being automated.

Authorship Labor and the Cost of Convenience

Ghost in the Machine also confronts the creative industry’s uneasy relationship with AI. As subscription based tools quietly incorporate generative systems artists are asked to surrender authorship in exchange for speed efficiency or professional relevance.

Veatch pushes back on this framing. Creativity she argues is not about output but intention. When machines generate images language or video without accountability the result is not empowerment but erasure.

The film exposes how AI systems rely on invisible labor data scraping and exploitative moderation practices often outsourced to marginalized communities. The convenience enjoyed by users is built on someone else’s unseen work.

Rejecting the Fantasy of Super Intelligence

Rather than indulging in apocalyptic or utopian narratives Ghost in the Machine dismantles the idea of super intelligence altogether. The film shows how claims of inevitable AI dominance function as a smokescreen diverting attention from real harms happening now.

Veatch argues that focusing on speculative futures allows corporations to avoid accountability in the present. While audiences debate whether machines will surpass humanity workers lose jobs creative ownership erodes and misinformation floods public discourse.

The film insists that the real crisis is not technological but political.

Sundance and a Necessary Intervention

Premiering at Sundance during the festival’s final year in Park City Ghost in the Machine arrives as both warning and intervention. It is not polished propaganda nor a high budget spectacle. It is direct urgent and deliberately human.

Veatch does not place herself at the center of the story. Instead she builds a collective portrait of expertise experience and resistance allowing the film to function as a shared act of witnessing.

In a media landscape saturated with hype Ghost in the Machine slows the conversation down. It asks audiences to question inevitability resist false binaries and reclaim authorship over both art and reality.

This is not a film about fearing technology. It is a film about refusing to surrender agency.

Ghost in the Machine screens as part of the Sundance Film Festival Documentary Program. Kickin' It with Tyree