Have you ever watched a movie that just left you speechless? Maybe one that made you scream as the credits rolled after a cliffhanger ending? Well, that’s just the art of filmmaking!
Whether you’re a rom-com lover or a horror enthusiast, the magic of movies is undeniable. The best part is that the viewers and the creatives behind the scenes are fully immersed. At least, that should be the case most of the time.
As times change, so does the industry. With the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), we all have many burning questions, even more so as awards season rolls around. A few nominated directors have implemented said technology in their movies. One question remains: is AI bound to appear in every film moving forward, or is its power purely overhyped? The answer is more complicated than we think.
What Is Artificial Intelligence?
As defined by Dictionary.com, AI is “the capacity of a computer, robot, programmed device, or software application to perform operations and tasks analogous to learning and decision making in humans, such as speech recognition or question answering.” In other words, AI is a computer algorithm that can replicate most things humans do, such as drawing, celebrity voices, and much more. It is pretty astounding just how powerful and scary it is.
However, the real problem is what fuels AI. The production of the metals that are found in AI hardware can lead to not only pollution but soil erosion as well. It also contributes to climate change as the hardware is powered by both electrical energy and minerals, increasing carbon emissions drastically.
Among many of the big corporations, Google reported that its carbon emissions from 2019 to 2023 rose by 48 percent. This jump can be linked to an increase in data centers and locations where hardware and computing machines are stored for the access and distribution of data.
How is AI Being Used in Modern Films?
If you’re a cinephile, like myself, or have found yourself doom-scrolling in the last few weeks, you’ll know that the 97th Academy Awards ceremony is approaching. Several nominated films have been criticized recently for various reasons, including several offensive past tweets made by a nominated actress and, of course, AI usage.
Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist has been one of the most scrutinized films due to its implementation of AI to enhance the Hungarian accents of its respective co-leads, Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones. Corbet mentioned that they did have previous editing tools at their disposal, but the film was entering a long postproduction stage.
The crew wanted to speed things up, so they used Respeecher, a Ukrainian AI company that uses software to generate AI voices. AI was also implemented to generate images of the building blueprints and concepts designed by Hungarian-Australian geologist Laszlo Toth.
The Brutalist is not the only Oscar-nominated film attached to an AI-related controversy. Emilia Pérez, directed by Jacques Audiard, is also under fire for utilizing AI. To expand the vocal range of Best Actress nominee Karla Sofía Gascón, the film hired the same company as Corbet did for The Brutalist: Respeecher. The software can clone voices for the musical numbers, as Gascon noted herself that she is not a singer, and the songs proved to be somewhat difficult.
So, What’s Next in the Future of Filmmaking?
As technology continues to advance, we will only continue seeing the growing capabilities and effects of AI on every human-led industry. But this doesn’t mean we should panic! We were all witnesses to the writers’ strikes in the summer of 2023, led by the Writer’s Guild of America (WGA) and the Screen Actors Guild (SAG).
Not only were the WGA and SAG striking for their right to wage increases for streaming residuals, but they were also protesting the hiring of AI companies to replace their writers and actors with technology.
If there is anything we should take away from those protests, it is that our voices do not go unheard. Even if the use of AI seems minimal right now, it will only increase in the following years. There is no better time than now to learn, educate, regroup, and urge companies to consider the long-lasting consequences. Not just for the sake of the environment but for creators’ rights to express themselves without the intrusion of artificial intelligence.
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