VENICE, Sept 10 — A “lacerating” documentary about Elon Musk from acclaimed US director Alex Gibney premiered at the Venice Film Festival on Tuesday with one critic saying it had “thrashed” the erratic provocateur.

Gibney in his nearly four-hour work traces South Africa-born Musk’s career and life from a Silicon Valley dot.com entrepreneur in the early 2000s to becoming the world’s first trillionaire.

Film bible Variety called it “a lacerating portrait’, while Deadline said the “damning” movie had “thrashed” Musk as “petty, narcissistic, megalomaniacal, cruel.”

Here are some of the key points from the vast film:

Not a romantic 

Musk’s first wife Justine provides some of the most touching, humane moments in the film as she reflects on her relationship with the buddying businessman as he made his first millions.

As well as breaking down in tears as she remembers the death of their first child, she delivers some eye-popping anecdotes about the difficulties she endured.

While dancing at their wedding, Musk whispered into her ear: “I am the alpha in this relationship.”

She says she and other partners are referred to as “breeders”.

NDAs 

After having a secret child with right-wing influencer Ashley St Clair — one of a known 14 kids fathered by Musk — the entrepreneur’s fixer Jared Birchall called to offer her a deal.

In return for an upfront payment of US$15 million (RM61 million) and US$100,000 a month for 21 years thereafter, she would agree to never disclose Musk’s name.

She refused — and became one of Gibney’s most important sources.

Covid switch 

The documentary traces Musk’s political conversion from a left-leaning entrepreneur to one of the most influential backers of far-right politicians in the world to the Covid 19 pandemic in 2020.

“Covid is when some switch flipped in his mind,” former friend and philosopher Sam Harris told Gibney.

Around this time, Musk’s eldest son transitioned to become female, which Musk described as a result of the “woke mind virus”.

A snub from then-president Joe Biden at an electric car event at the White House is also seen as pivotal.

Drugs 

The documentary sheds little new light on Musk’s reported use of drugs including ketamine and LSD, relying on existing reporting from The Wall Street Journal.

But it reveals that Musk spoke to WSJ owner Rupert Murdoch to ask him to block the paper’s story — apparently to no avail.

No Musk 

Musk refused to speak to Gibney when he started working on the film and called him a “douchebag” on his social network X.

The director of Taxi to the Dark Side innovates, using an AI-generated version of Musk reading out statements he has made in past interviews.

Elsewhere, the filmmaker relies on a selection of former partners, former friends and ex-business partners, all of whom have an axe to grind with the world’s richest man.

Data 

The documentary ends with an eviseration of Musk’s time as head of bureaucracy-slashing “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) under US President Donald Trump, whom Musk spent US$300 million helping elect in 2024.

As well as linking DOGE to thousands of deaths because of cuts to American aid overseas, it also claims Musk used it to shut down ongoing investigations against him and access information to help his companies.

Gibney speculates about what Musk’s small team of 20-something computer coders did with all the data they accessed in the federal government’s systems — suggesting it might be weaponised in the future.

Plan B 

Gibney concludes that Musk has gone all-in on artificial intelligence and has stopped worrying about the technology leading to the extinction of humanity because he has a plan B.

Musk’s obsession with sending people to Mars and other planets via his SpaceX rockets is a potentially lucrative “hedge” against AI getting out of control — for those with the means to pay, the documentary maker says. — AFP