Feed: Engadget is a web magazine with obsessive daily coverage of everything new in gadgets and consumer electronics
Feed Link: https://www.engadget.com/
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Title: Apple and A24 are developing a Sam Bankman-Fried movie written by Lena
Dunham

Date: Wed, 13 Nov 2024 13:30:22 +0000
Link: https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/stream...

Apple and art house film company A24 are in early development on a film about
convicted crypto scammer Sam Bankman-Fried with a script written by Lena
Dunham, Variety reported. The project will be based on the Michael Lewis book
Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon that many critics found
overly deferential to Bankman-Fried.

The book describes the dizzying rise and equally vertiginous fall of Bankman-
Fried and his FTX crypto exchange and Alameda hedge fund. However, it paints
the FTX founder as a benevolent prodigy and glosses over the fact that he
embezzled billions of dollars from customers and spent it on things like
celebrity endorsements, political donations and high-end real-estate
purchases.

FTX was worth billions at its peak, but the exchange eventually collapsed and
Bankman-Fried was convicted of fraud and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Most FTX customers will get their original investments back, plus interest,
but that's based on a bitcoin price of around $17,000 ΓÇö and the current
price is nearly five times that.

Basing the film on Lewis's fawning hagiography isn't a promising start.
Hopefully, Dunham or other writers will also draw on far better books (like
Numbers Go Up by Zeke Faux) that show the dark, scammy side of crypto
promoters like Bankman-Fried and the entire industry in general.

Apple Original Films and A24 have announced other collaborations recently,
including the Spike Lee and Denzel Washington film High and Low. Other
scripted FTX projects are also in the works, including a limited Amazon Prime
series from the Russo brothers based on the 2022 FTX collapse.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at
https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/stream...
a-sam-bankman-fried-movie-written-by-lena-dunham-133022680.html?src=rss

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