Asif Kapadia sees a future vision of the world where “chairwoman” Ivanka Trump is celebrating her 30th year as leader of a nightmarish fascist police state that was once America, a land mostly reduced to rubble following an unknown “catastrophe” that occurred in 2036.

“It’s kind of a joke, but it’s also not a joke,” says the British filmmaker of mentioning Donald Trump’s daughter in “2073,” his chilling docudrama about the dystopia humanity is potentially hurtling towards and the very real and very contemporary factors concerning politics, the environment, corruption, race and technology that he says are propelling us in that direction.

“Because if you look at American politics, you have certain families that just keep being in power — the number of people that have come from a tiny gene pool is insane,” he says.

While the inclusion of Ivanka may be a little splash of humor, the rest...