Hollywood Hunts Bitcoin’s Phantom Founder in Thriller “Killing Satoshi”

Hollywood is gearing up to dramatise the origins of Bitcoin (BTC) with Killing Satoshi, a conspiracy thriller centered on the secret identity of Bitcoin’s creator. 

The film will be directed by Doug Liman, known for The Bourne Identity and Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and, as if the movie title wasn’t bad enough, it will feature Casey Affleck and Pete Davidson in leading roles.

Written by Nick Schenk, whose previous work includes Gran Torino and The Mule, the screenplay follows a fictional elite group attempting to suppress the truth about Nakamoto’s identity. Liman described the film as a “David and Goliath” narrative, challenging the foundations of money and power.

Related: Analyst Warns U.S. XRP ETFs Could Mark “Beginning of the End”

Productions to Kick Off In October

Production, led by Ryan Kavanaugh, Lawrence Grey, and Shane Valdez, is scheduled to begin in October in London and eyes a release in mid-2026. The project is being produced by Kavanaugh, who previously led Relativity Media and attempted to tokenise film funding through a project called Proxicoin (which never really took off).

Kavanaugh told Variety that the thematic approach of Killing Satoshi is similar to that of The Social Network, which chronicled Facebook’s rise:

This is not just a movie about Bitcoin and its elusive and mysterious origins but really about what it stands for. We look at this film much the same way as we did with ‘Social Network’ and its examination of Facebook. This should equally be a look into the world of what Bitcoin really is.

Ryan Kavanaugh

Satoshi Nakamoto launched Bitcoin in 2009 and vanished from public view in 2011. But there are wallets linked to Nakamoto that contain roughly 1.1 million BTC, currently valued at about US$122B (AU$186B).

Related: Bitfinex Analysts Say Bitcoin Correction Deepens, But Signs Point to a Nearing Floor