The story follows a fading director who creates a virtual actress to star in his films and the attempts he makes to keep her non-presence a secret as she becomes more famous.

Taransky initially claims that Simone is a recluse and requests that her privacy be respected, but that merely intensifies media demands for her to appear.

Two determined tabloid reporters discover that Taransky used out-of-date stock photography as the background during an interview, and they blackmail him into providing Simone for a live appearance.

Not only does it fail to achieve the desired effect of audience alienation, it also serves to foster her credibility as a risk-taking, fearless and avant-garde artist.

Taransky's subsequent attempts to discredit Simone by having her drink, smoke and curse at public appearances, and use politically incorrect statements backfire when the press instead begins to see her as refreshingly honest.

They restore Simone and have her appear on national television holding up a newspaper headline with her obituary, along with a story that her death was a hoax.

Like Andrew Niccol's predecessor Gattaca, Simone deals with themes of the problematic aspects of technological advances being used to attempt to attain perfection.

[2] Pruitt Taylor Vince and Jason Schwartzman were cast as obese tabloid investigator Max Sayer and his shady-looking but peculiarly childlike assistant Milton, respectively.

Principal photography was by Edward Lachman, while the entirety of the production was made in California, using the Getty stock footage to fill in for locations such as Egypt's Great Pyramids.

A post-credits sequence shows Viktor creating fake footage of Simone in a supermarket, which one of her pursuers sees and believes it to be real.

"[2] The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw wrote, "It's reasonable material, but there are no real plot twists or unexpected implications; it all just rolls out easily in a Hollywood that director Niccol makes appear so unreal as to be an easy target.

"[7] Marc Savlov of The Austin Chronicle said, "What really irked me about Simone was that it stank of the very thing it appeared to be mocking: it's a big-budget, commercial film taking potshots at big-budget, commercial filmmaking (as well as overripe, over-earnest indies), and although it strives constantly for a sense of knowing, winking irony, the only thing ironic about it is how much it resembles its supposed target.