Netflix’s doomsday thriller “Leave the World Behind” carries an urgent warning about our faith in technology, among many other topics. During one notable set piece, Julia Roberts’ character has to dodge incoming Teslas piling up on a highway that has been hacked through the cars’ self-driving feature. The scene demonstrates how modern technology can be used against us for destructive purposes — but it doesn’t seem like Tesla founder Elon Musk saw it that way.
The streamer recently posted the Tesla attack scene from “Leave the World Behind” on social media in its entirety, which garnered an unexpected response from Musk: “Teslas can charge from solar panels even if the world goes fully Mad Max and there is no more gasoline!”
Musk used the scene to show that Teslas can use solar panels to charge, even though the scene proves how hackers could theoretically use technology such as self-driving cars against us and cause mass destruction. “Leave the World Behind” viewers were quick to mock Musk for missing the point of the scene, with many wondering if he even watched the movie.
“Leave the World Behind” is directed by “Mr. Robot” creator Sam Esmail and is based on the 2020 novel of the same name by Rumaan Alam. The plot centers on a couple played by Julia Roberts and Ethan Hawke whose family getaway is enhanced when the owner of their rental home and his daughter (Mahershala Ali and Myha’la) show up unannounced to spend the night. The owner brings words of an attack threatening the world, which forces the two families under the same roof.
Author Rumaan Alam recently spoke to Variety about the Netflix movie, which like the book does not offer any concrete answers about the doomsday event playing out. Some characters share their theories for what’s going on, but none of them are ever confirmed.
“That was such a fundamental part of the writing process for me, is that I also don’t know,” Alam said. “My first editor on this book said to me, ‘I understand that it’s imperative that you dance around what’s really happening.’ And then she mentioned aliens, and I was like, ‘Aliens? Really, that’s where your head went?’ But I also find that so pleasurable because I don’t get to control what people are thinking, and readers come to something with their own frame of reference.”
