Paul Verhoeven, president of the Jury of the 67th International Berlin Film Festival, gestures as he poses for media during a photo call at the 2017 Berlinale Film Festival in Berlin, Germany, Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)
BERLIN (AP) --
The curtain is going up on the annual Berlin International Film Festival, with a French film about jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt kicking off the first of the year's major European movie fests.
"Django," from first-time director Etienne Comar, is the first of 18 movies competing for the festival's top Golden Bear award.
This year's diverse program includes Oren Moverman's drama "The Dinner," starring Richard Gere and Laura Linney; a documentary on artist Joseph Beuys by German director Andres Veiel; and British director Sally Potter's "The Party."
A seven-member jury led by Dutch director Paul Verhoeven will announce the winners of the Golden Bear and other honors Feb. 18.
Verhoeven said Thursday he hoped to see diverse and "hopefully controversial" movies, "where we as a jury would really have heated arguments."
Suchir Balaji poses for a photo in Hawaii in 2018. Balaji was a former OpenAI engineer and whistleblower who died in November 2024. (Balaji Ramamurthy via AP)
Suchir Balaji, a former OpenAI engineer and whistleblower who helped train the artificial intelligence systems behind ChatGPT and later said he believed those practices violated copyright law, has died, according to his parents and San Francisco officials. He was 26.
Balaji worked at OpenAI for nearly four years before quitting in August. He was well-regarded by colleagues at the San Francisco company, where a co-founder this week called him one of OpenAI's strongest contributors who was essential to developing some of its products.
"We are devastated to learn of this incredibly sad news and our hearts go out to Suchir's loved ones during this difficult time," said a statement from OpenAI.
Balaji was found dead in his San Francisco apartment on Nov. 26 in what police said "appeared to be a suicide. No evidence of foul play was found during the initial investigation." The city's chief medical examiner's office confirmed the manner of death to be suicide.
His parents Poornima Ramarao and Balaji Ramamurthy said they are still seeking answers, describing their son as a "happy, smart and brave young man" who loved to hike and recently returned from a trip with friends.
Balaji grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and first arrived at the fledgling AI research lab for a 2018 summer internship while studying computer science at the University of California, Berkeley. He returned a few years later to work at OpenAI, where one of his first projects, called WebGPT, helped pave the way for ChatGPT.
"Suchir's contributions to this project were essential, and it wouldn't have succeeded without him," said OpenAI co-founder John Schulman in a social media post memorializing Balaji. Schulman, who recruited Balaji to his team, said what... Read More
