Can A.I. Complicate a Filmmaker’s Legacy?
Martin Scorsese has joined the ranks of directors advocating for the use of artificial intelligence in the filmmaking process. I’m still working through my own frustrated ambivalence over its impact
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On to today’s topic …
Last week, it was announced that Martin Scorsese had used and would promote the use of AI technology developed by the startup Black Forest Labs for pre-production storyboard work on his forthcoming film adaptation of What Happens at Night, which will star Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence.
The news sent a collective shiver down the spine of a devout cohort of working artists and cinephiles who receive any AI-related story with some combination of suspicion and rage. Particularly in the case of Scorsese, a man who looms large as the high priest of handmade film artistry, it came as a shock. I’ve tried to resist overreacting to news like this. In early 2025, The Brutalist came under fire for its alleged uses of artificial intelligence to sharpen Adrien Brody’s Hungarian speech and blueprint illustrations that would represent the work of the fictionalized architect Laszlo Toth. I recall saying on The Big Picture at the time that if the use of any artificial intelligence in a film is a dealbreaker, it will be virtually impossible to enjoy feature films going forward. I would not call this my endorsement of the technology, nor would I say I have hard-and-fast rules on it in any direction. It’s hard to be definitive about moving goalposts. Broadly, I’d prefer that it were never invented and remained but a dark dream in James Cameron’s soul. I like when humans make stuff. It’s one of the best things about being alive, stumbling upon something that some beautiful weirdos made together.
