Self-driving cars

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THE AUTOMATIC MOTORIST, A BRITISH short film from 1911, wants you to avoid self-driving cars at all costs. In it, a robot chauffeur is developed to drive a newly wedded couple to their honeymoon destination. But this robot malfunctions, and all of a sudden the couple is marooned in outer space (and then sinking underwater, and then flying through the sky—it’s complicated). Directed by filmmaker and magician Walter R. Booth, The Automatic Motorist is a trick film—a genre of silent films popular in the early 1900s that emphasized special effects. The full 6-minute short should be watched in its entirety, but we present you with a brief analysis below.

This Bizarre 1911 Film Warns of the Perils of Self-Driving Cars - Atlas Obscura