The Controversy Surrounding the 2025 Academy Awards: AI

Every year, cinephiles across the globe wait anxiously for the announcement of the nominees for arguably the most esteemed award show of the year: the Academy Awards (otherwise known as the Oscars). This year, two films emerged as front-runners to take home the most coveted awards of the evening, those being The Brutalist and Emilia Perez. However, aside from being the two movies receiving the most nominations, they also have something else in common: their use of Artificial Intelligence.  

In The Brutalist, directed by Brady Corbet and starring Adrien Brody, AI software “Respeecher” was used to enhance the Hungarian accents the characters had. Similarly in Emilia Perez, directed by Jacques Audiard, the same software was used to enhance actress Karla Sofía Gascón’s singing voice to reach notes not in her musical range.  

The court of public opinion absolutely exploded at the breaking of this information, with some people even demanding the movies be disqualified from the awards ceremony. While this might be a little harsh, it is easy to understand how this could undermine the integrity of the movies—more importantly, the acting. 

The ability for an actor to develop an accent or musical range for a film isn’t anything new, with many actors and actresses winning Oscars due in part to their ability to utilize an accent foreign to their own. A prime example of this is Daniel Day-Lewis in the movie Lincoln (2012), who remarkably embodied the Illinois accent of Abraham Lincoln despite being English. Other examples include Meryl Streep in Sophie’s Choice (1982), Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight (2008), and Christian Bale in The Fighter (2010).

The use of technology to enhance movies is not anything new, as computer-generated imagery (CGI) has been utilized for the past 7 decades. That being said, CGI and AI are not synonymous, and AI usage in movies is generally new and uncharted waters for many filmmakers and members of the Academy. There isn’t any real precedent set regarding filmmakers using AI in their movies. 

In recent years, AI technology has been a grave concern with many celebrities and public figures because of the growing use of Deepfake technology to paste false images of actors in compromising or controversial situations to harm their reputation. This certain disdain for the use of AI presents a paradoxical situation for people in the industry as they are now implementing software into their projects and can account for the confusion portrayed by the public. 

There is a real fear that AI usage in films that are nominated for and very well may win Oscars may open the door for more egregious use of AI in movies. People believe that AI will not only change the way we watch movies forever but will actually end up taking jobs away from the directors, actors, editors and filmmakers who originally introduced the software into their projects. 

While the extensive use of AI features is still in its infancy and hasn’t become a widespread practice, there is certainly a lack of transparency surrounding the intentions and future of the practice altogether. With the Oscars airing on March 2^nd, we will see soon how the Academy reacts to the controversial practice, and we will have to wait and see for what the future holds for AI technology in filmmaking.