Second ‘Mountainhead’ Trailer Suggests AI (and Its Billionaire Characters) Are the Villains

As the world outside their isolated retreat starts to go sideways, the four billionaires at the center of HBO’s movie Mountainhead confront their possible roles in causing the events.

Well, maybe “confront” is too strong. “Deny” might be better, based on a second trailer for the film from Succession creator Jesse Armstrong. When a news report says “U.N officials are now openly attributing the recent uptick in ethnic tension to powerful new generative AI tools” from a company headed by one of the four central characters, Venis (Cory Michael Smith).

“I just want to say, this is not on you, Venis,” the gathering’s host, Souper (Jason Schwartzman), tells Venis — to which he replies, “Obviously it’s not on me. Why would you even say that?” Watch the trailer below.

The new trailer builds on an earlier clip and states a little more clearly that the group — Steve Carell and Ramy Youssef also star — bears some responsibility for the worldwide unrest. It also suggests that they see a way out by literally buying several countries.

Mountainhead marks Armstrong’s directing debut on a feature film and his first writing credit since Succession concluded its four-season Emmy-rich run on HBO in 2023. HBO announced the movie in January, and from there it was more or less a sprint to its May 31 premiere date. The four stars came aboard in early March, and filming wrapped about a month later after shooting in Park City, Utah. 

Hadley Robinson, Andy Daly, Ali Kinkade, Daniel Oreskes, David Thompson, Amie MacKenzie and Ava Kostia also star.

Armstrong wrote and directed the movie and executive produces with Frank Rich, Lucy Prebble, Jon Brown, Tony Roche, Will Tracy, Mark Mylod and Jill Footlick.